Bank

One of the large changes in the bank regulatory environment is the new focus on customer satisfaction with the mortgage process. Central to the Bureau’s mission is listening and responding to consumers.  The Bureau has made it easy for the consumer, via their website, and encourages consumers to report their experiences with financial institutions.  Just three quarters of the way through last year the CFPB reported that over 139,000 complaints had been registered, and over 50% of those complaints were with the mortgage process!  Not good for the community banker! 

Last month JP Morgan Chase announced a pullback from residential mortgage lending and their expectations for 2014

Home lending has been "the most painful business ever," JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon said at an investor presentation, when they announced another cut of 6,000 mortgage jobs for this year, on top of 11,000 last year.  With that came a forecast that its mortgage division would not turn a profit this year, though Dimon restated ‘we are here for the long game’. 

A new report by RealtyTrac shows that 96 percent of the counties that they track are better off than they were four years ago. But still, there’s a ways to go in the housing market, with only 8 percent of the 410 U.S. counties analyzed faring better than they did during the housing boom eight years ago.

RealtyTrac analyzes housing market health by gauging four main categories: home price appreciation, affordability, percentage of bank-owned REO sales, and the unemployment rate.

Ever since the Home Valuation Code of Conduct was announced the market share of AMC's has been increasing.  Before the HVCC (pre-2009) AMC's had a market share of approximately 20%.  Not a very high number.  Todays estimate of AMC's Origination Share is 60% of the total market.  The HVCC originally just placed a buffer between appraisers and loan officers to prevent pressure being placed on the appraiser to inflate values and only concerned Fannie-Freddie funded loans. With the 2010 Inter Agency Appraisal and Evaluation Guidelines that were announced by the joint federal financial regulatory agencies the focus became the need for quality control with qualitative reviews.

One of many issues that the Dodd-Frank Act touched was supervision of appraisal management companies.  Banks and appraisers both, are overseen by multiple agencies, it’s only fair that AMC’s are also.  Minimum requirements for state registration and supervision of appraisal management companies were provided in the Act.  On March 24, six federal agencies jointly issued a proposed rule to implement these requirements.  The agencies are the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Consumer Financial Protection Agency and the National Credit Union Administration. 

Under the proposed rule, participating states would require that an AMC:

Wow, a lot of headlines for this week!  

Yellen hints rate hike is possible around mid-2015  

WASHINGTON • Janet Yellen tried at her first news conference as Federal Reserve chair to clarify a question that's consumed investors: When will the Fed start raising short-term interest rates from record lows?

Yellen stressed that with the job market still weak, the Fed intends to keep short-term rates near zero for a "considerable" time and would raise them only gradually. And she said the Fed wouldn't be dictated solely by the unemployment rate, which Yellen feels overstates the health of the job market and the economy.

SAMCO is excited to announce we will be fully integrated with Encompass Loan Origination Software effective on the 3/6/2014 release update. This Encompass integration gives our Clients who utilize Encompass the ability to list SAMCO as the appraisal service provider within Encompass and orders can be facilitated from the Encompass software to auto populate new orders within the SAMCO platform. Outlined below are some of the key features of the integration.
 
SAMCO - Encompass Integration Functionality

They say nothing in life is certain but death and taxes, though it may be time to add mortgage payments to that list. A woman’s “mummified” body was recently discovered by a contractor in a garage of a foreclosed home in Pontiac, Mich. It seems the woman’s death went unnoticed for years partially because she stayed current on her mortgage each month until recently. The woman had automatic payments coming from her bank account each month to cover her mortgage. But police say that the woman, who was in her 40s, likely died back in 2008.

“She had $54,000 in her account and her bills were being deducted,” says Undersheriff Mike McCabe. “Eventually the money ran out and her house went into foreclosure.”

Most community banks are searching for creative ways to not just improve their bottom line, but to grow!  More than a third of community bankers who responded to this year’s ICBA Industry Report Card survey, plan to increase marketing budgets in 2014 while over half will maintain their 2013 levels.  Many community bank board’s realize that their efficiency ratio is in the 70’s or higher, when they should be in the mid 60’s and are turning to third party vendors to help reduce overhead. 

When the 2010 Interagency Appraisal and Evaluation Guidelines were printed in December of 2010 there were many new requirements and a restating of many old ones. 

Section VIII Minimum Appraisal Standards at the top of Page 9 of 45 states: