• Wells Fargo has a new home loan sales leader

    Wells Fargo has a new home loan sales leader,James Kleimann

    Sandra Ho, a managing director at JPMorgan Chase, will join Wells Fargo next week as its head of home lending sales, Wells Fargo said in a statement Monday.It is a newly created role, and Ho will lead Wells Fargo’s consumer direct and distributed sales forces. She will report to Serhat Oztop, head o

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  • DOJ: Offers of agent compensation ’should not be made anywhere’

    DOJ: Offers of agent compensation ’should not be made anywhere’,Brooklee Han

    At a status hearing on Tuesday for the Nosalek commission lawsuit, a lawyer for the Department of Justice said the terms of the National Association of Realtors’ nationwide commission lawsuit settlement agreement represented “an improvement.” However, it remains unknown if the DOJ will file a statem

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  • Rocket settles $3.5M lawsuit alleging unpaid employee overtime

    Rocket settles $3.5M lawsuit alleging unpaid employee overtime,Chris Clow

    Rocket Mortgage has entered into a settlement agreement with a group of current and former employees who have alleged the company did not provide sufficient overtime pay, according to court documents reviewed by HousingWire and reporting at Bloomberg Law.In a case filed in January 2023 in the U.S. D

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  • Zillow’s new AI tool aims to promote equality in housing

    Zillow’s new AI tool aims to promote equality in housing,Neil Pierson

    Zillow announced the release of an open-source tool, the Fair Housing Classifier, on Tuesday as part of the company’s efforts to “promote responsible and unbiased behavior in real estate conversations powered by large language model (LLM) technology.“In a news release, Zillow explained that artifici

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  • Single-family rental market continues to display strength

    Single-family rental market continues to display strength,Sarah Marx

    U.S. single-family rent growth strengthened overall in March despite some weaknesses in specific markets.Single-family rent increases in March 2024 registered a 3.4% year-over-year gain, unchanged from February, according to CoreLogic’s latest Single-Family Rent Index (SFRI). The SFRI analyzes singl

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  • Zillow providing open-source technology to promote fair housing in AI-powered real estate conversations

    Zillow providing open-source technology to promote fair housing in AI-powered real estate conversations,
  • Chopra says he is ‘open to’ reviewing the LO comp rule

    Chopra says he is ‘open to’ reviewing the LO comp rule,James Kleimann

    Rohit Chopra, director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), is aware that some loan officers are taking creative — and, as detailed in a recent HousingWire investigation, often illegal — approaches to winning business. And he would be willing to reexamine the decade-old rule that proh

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  • RentSpree announces new MLS partnerships 

    RentSpree announces new MLS partnerships ,Sarah Marx

    Rental software provider RentSpree announced on Monday a new partnership with UtahRealEstate.com (URE), a multiple listing service (MLS) serving approximately 20,000 real estate professionals across Utah. Additionally, RentSpree CEO Michael Lucarelli revealed in a LinkedIn post a new collaboration w

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  • PennyMac announces proposed private offering of $650M in senior notes

    PennyMac announces proposed private offering of $650M in senior notes,Chris Clow

    California-based multichannel lender and servicer PennyMac Financial Services announced on Monday a proposed private offering of a $650 million aggregate principal amount of senior notes that the company says it will pay back with interest by 2030.The notes will “be fully and unconditionally guarant

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  • Chopra: Credit reporting industry’s fee hikes “raise big questions”

    Chopra: Credit reporting industry’s fee hikes “raise big questions”,James Kleimann

    The setting could not have been more appropriate. Rohit Chopra, the head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and frequent critic Bob Broeksmit, the president and CEO of the Mortgage Bankers Association, sparring on stage over what constituted a junk fee. Chopra, the consumer watchdog, noted

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  • HUD to double servicer fee on assumable mortgages

    HUD to double servicer fee on assumable mortgages,Flávia Furlan Nunes

    The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) announced on Monday morning an extension to Ginnie Mae’s digital collateral program and an increase to fees servicers can charge on assumable mortgages, aiming to bring more efficiency and affordability to the housing market. “The past four

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  • More listings see a price cut: Will home prices drop?

    More listings see a price cut: Will home prices drop?,Mike Simonsen

    The most notable trend in U.S. housing data recently is that price reductions are on the way up. There are more homes sitting on the market that didn’t get offers at their original list price and have had to reduce their prices than in any recent May.What does this leading indicator data tell us abo

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  • Polly integrates with nCino’s Mortgage Suite

    Polly integrates with nCino’s Mortgage Suite,Sarah Marx

    Mortgage capital markets tech firm Polly announced on Monday its API integration with cloud banking provider nCino to enhance the digital mortgage process for lenders. This integration combines Polly’s advanced pricing engine with nCino’s Mortgage Suite point-of-sale (POS) solution, offering lenders

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  • HUD publishes several changes to reverse mortgage handbook section

    HUD publishes several changes to reverse mortgage handbook section,Chris Clow

    The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) on Monday published a new version of its Single Family Housing Handbook 4000.1, which includes numerous updates to its guidance for the Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) program overseen by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA).“Toda

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  • New homes account for one in three homes for sale: Redfin 

    New homes account for one in three homes for sale: Redfin ,Sarah Marx

    The proportion of newly built homes for sale in the U.S. during the first quarter of 2024 remained steady compared to last year, fueled by a continued shortage of existing-home supply. According to a Redfin report released Monday, newly built homes accounted for 33.4% of single-family homes for sale

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  • CFPB official talks reverse mortgage safety, counseling resources

    CFPB official talks reverse mortgage safety, counseling resources,Chris Clow

    Buying into homeownership is already challenging enough for many Americans, but keeping — and maintaining — a home can come with serious challenges as a person gets older. This may lead an older homeowner to consider a product like a reverse mortgage, but potential borrowers should be aware of the p

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  • New listings data falls for third week in a row 

    New listings data falls for third week in a row ,Logan Mohtashami

    New listings data has been moving lower over the last few weeks. I usually wouldn’t care too much about this as its a data line that can be volatile week to week but now it’s been three weeks. The moves haven’t been significant and our weekly pending contracts data picked up this week. But, we need

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  • Chase Home Lending increases its closing guarantee

    Chase Home Lending increases its closing guarantee,Sarah Marx

    Chase Home Lending, the consumer and commercial banking arm of JPMorgan Chase & Co., has raised its closing guarantee from $5,000 to $20,000 until July 27, 2024, the bank announced on Thursday. The guarantee means that the bank promises an on-time closing on or before the contract closing date, or i

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  • Mortgage advisory firms Stratmor Group, Teraverde merge

    Mortgage advisory firms Stratmor Group, Teraverde merge,James Kleimann

    Mortgage advisory firm Stratmor Group has merged with Teraverde, a mortgage advisory firm and technology solutions provider, in a deal that the companies say will allow them to expand the markets they serve and the depth of services provided. The terms of the deal were not disclosed.Both firms will

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  • East Coast, Midwest cities dominate 2024 best places for veterans to live

    East Coast, Midwest cities dominate 2024 best places for veterans to live,Sarah Marx

    The East Coast and Midwest stand out as prime locations for veterans and current military service members, according to the 2024 Best Cities for Veterans to Live list compiled by Veterans United Home Loans. Tampa emerged as the top metro area for veterans. It was followed by Rochester, Minnesota; Wi

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