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More Americans expect that home prices will recover over the course of 2012, just as they believe that mortgage rates will remain at all-time lows and more think the economy will enter an upswing. Mortgage giant Fannie Mae said in a January National Housing Survey that 28 percent of Americans believe that home prices will rise over the next year by 1 percent, up from 2 percent last month. Of the survey respondents, 8 percent said that interest rates for mortgage loans will decline in 2012, down 2 percent from December.

Homebuilder confidence in the single-family market ended the fourth quarter last year on a climb uphill as the wider economy showed improvement. The National Association of Home Builders released a market index Tuesday that recorded a four-point increase year-over-year to 18 for homebuilders in the single-family sector. The index fielded improvements across the board year-over-year, with confidence about current sales ticking up four points to 17 and anticipated sales for the next six months up two points to 26.

The president of the St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank, James Bullard, made national headlines recently following his strong statements regarding the state of U.S. real estate. Among the revelations included in Bullard's February speech - the declaration that nation's housing markets have officially hit bottom. During his speaking engagement in Chicago, Bullard applied pressure to the Federal Open Market Committee, calling the group's decision to extend ultra-low interest rates until 2014 a looming disaster for the country. Bullard cited the decline in U.S. home prices and loss of wealth.

In Maryland, Maverick Funding Corp. is rolling out a new branch of its subsidiary, Reverse Mortgage Network. Recently announcing the addition of 40 reverse mortgage loan officers from within Baltimore-based Great Oak Funding, Maverick will conduct its expansion during the first two quarters of 2012.

Through its recent acquisition of property insurance company Crump Group Inc., BB&T Corporation has doubled its wholesale insurance business. Based in New Jersey, Crump is among the nation's leading providers of wholesale commercial insurance, as well as the largest independent wholesale distributor of life insurance in the U.S.

Nearly 85 percent of refinancing homeowners with first-lien loans maintained or reduced their current payments by paying in additional cash in the fourth quarter last year. Of these, according to recent analysis by mortgage giant Freddie Mac, 49 percent of borrowers slashed their principal payments by refinancing at current rates, compared with 37 percent who preserved their payments. So-called cash-out borrowers accounted for 15 percent of all refinance loans, the lowest percentage in the 26-year history of the GSE's analysis.

A still-brittle economic recovery picked up steam in January as the private sector added 243,000 jobs, driving unemployment figures to lows not seen in three years. The Labor Department said that the national unemployment rate fell to 8.3 percent, also signaling a fifth straight month for declines in the number of jobless Americans. Construction added 21,000 jobs from December, with gains for nonresidential construction and specialty trade contractors. Financial services lost some 5,000 jobs from last month by comparison.

Regional bank BB&T is starting of the year with a slew of awards for its Small Business and Middle Market banking groups. Between the two company divisions, BB&T earned 17 Greenwich Excellence Awards from Greenwich Associates.

Fairway Independent Mortgage Corporation has released its 2011 internal findings, and the company was pleased to announce that last year marked its second highest annual total for mortgage loan volume in Fairway's history.

Mortgage rates yet again slammed into all-time lows, with signs emerging that the economy may still need to improve and action from the Federal Reserve to keep a heel on interest rates until 2014. Finance Web site Bankrate.com and mortgage giant Freddie Mac offered up reports on interest rates for mortgage loans in two separate weekly surveys. The former found rates for the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage falling to 4.12 percent, down from 4.25 percent last week, while the GSE said that it declined from 3.98 percent to 3.88 percent over the same time frame.