Housing markets

Though housing is experiencing severe rate-related stress, mortgage banking remains central to the Denver-based bank's business model. The Texas market has held up better than much of the rest of the country, company executives say.

The increased limit on the size of the mortgages the government-sponsored enterprises will be able to buy reflects the year-over-year change in home prices.

JPMorgan Chase's asset-management arm entered into a deal to acquire more than $1 billion of single-family rentals, a sign that choppy markets haven't scared investors away from suburban housing.

Choices of which homes are used for comparisons play a major role in disparate home valuations for Black and white homeowners, according to studies recently released by the National Community Reinvestment Coalition and academic researchers.

It came as a surprise to many housing experts that Asian, Black and Hispanic homeownership rates all jumped last year by more than 2 percentage points, according to quarterly Census Bureau data.

The middle of a housing market downturn is no time to experiment with untested underwriting tools.

Frustrations with gatekeeping, a lack of diversity and the way home appraisal is overseen are spurring many practitioners to call for an overhaul of the industry's governance structure.

Bank lending activity grew at a strong clip in the second quarter and continues to expand. Yet rising interest rates and recession concerns could hamper future growth.

Small-business owners who can't get loans from traditional sources need alternative ways to access capital.

Wells Fargo missed analysts’ earnings estimates as home lending slowed and the bank set aside more than expected for potentially soured loans as the Federal Reserve’s rate hikes started to cool the once-hot housing market.

Even with another annual surge of over 20%, the pace of home-price growth eased in May and experts anticipate even further moderation over the next year.

Risky loan applications had been on the rise for more than a year, according to the analytics firm CoreLogic. Now that activity is slowing down, lenders face a higher risk of fraud, and many could be ill-equipped to handle it.

Former FHFA director Mark Calabria said the mortgage market was a “ticking time bomb” on track for a 2008-like crisis. Other experts foresee a tamer end to the bull housing market.

Democrats cited the increasing share of home purchases by Wall Street firms while Republicans pointed to rising conforming loan limits and other measures by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac during the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs committee hearing.

The standards, if finalized, could shed light on how Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are complying with the Federal Housing Finance Agency's new capital framework.

The very smallest banks, whose numbers shrank during the financial crisis, were most likely to express concern that the housing market will imperil the broader economy.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell is dismissing claims that loose monetary policy has led to rising home values and shrinking inventory and insists that the market is buoyed by creditworthy borrowers and investors.

The end of the refinancing boom and impending rise in rates are not the only challenges lenders face. As one observer put it, they "can't make loans on homes that don't exist."

The reduction currently under consideration by the Biden Administration would lead to even faster home price appreciation, especially in areas with moderate FHA presence, says Tobias Peter, the American Enterprise Institute’s director of housing research.

Default risks soar in minority neighborhoods during challenging economic times because, data shows, homes there are overpriced relative to incomes. Zoning and other changes could make loans more affordable by boosting housing stock and driving down prices.