Mortgage companies cut their payrolls by 6,100 full-time workers in August as employment in the residential finance industry hit a new low.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported last week that employment in the mortgage banker/broker sector fell to 261,200 jobs in August from 267,300 in July.
Jay Brinkmann, the chief economist for the Mortgage Bankers Association, said servicers are hiring workers to deal with rising delinquencies and loan modifications. However, that hiring has been offset by reductions in staff because of bank mergers, back-office consolidation and a reliance on temporary workers and contractors, Brinkman said.
He noted that the bankruptcy of Taylor, Bean & Whitaker of Ocala, Fla., will not show up in the bureau's mortgage jobs data until next month's report. (Some of Taylor Bean's West Coast account executives were recently hired by CMG Mortgage of San Ramon, Calif.)
There is a one-month lag in the reporting of mortgage industry employment data.
