Origination

This year has been dubbed as one the best in terms of home prices and sales, especially during the spring and summer seasons. One competition that has been in the balance for all eternity is the contest between buyers and sellers. It's the age-old competition in the history of the housing market, but only one can ultimately have the power.

The Federal Open Market Committee will convene next week for the last time this year and are expected to sweep the industry will a change to the federal funds rate, something that has not been done since June 2006.

The year 2016 is expected to usher in the creation of 1.25 million new households, higher rental demand, increased home sales, and a rise in home purchase loan originations even as refinancing volume plummets, CoreLogic’s Chief Economist predicted Monday.

Guardian Mortgage recently added Donna Greiner as SVP of Correspondent Lending in its Plano, Texas office. Greiner's mortgage career inlclude over 25 years' experience in loan origination, affiliated business arrangements, multi-state lending, construction lending, and multi-state REO sales.

Wells Fargo & Company recently announced that Timothy J. Sloan will now serve as President and COO, reporting to Chairman and CEO John G. Stumpf. Sloan has been with Wells Fargo for 28 years, and since 2014, he has served at the head of Wholesale Banking—a role he will remain in. Prior to this position, he was Wells Fargo's CFO from 2011 to 2014.

Lending.com, a lending-as-a-service platform recently appointed Liz Verrier as General Counsel. According to the company, in her new role as Lending.com's Chief Legal Officer, she will provide legal guidance to their board of directors and upper-level management.

According to Black Knight Financial Services, Inc., latest Mortgage Monitor Report, high LTV purchase originations rose 20 percent in the third quarter of 2015, compared to the 13 percent increase in the purchase market overall.

"This decline in repeat borrowers is strongest along the U.S. coasts, where the housing crisis diminished borrowers’ abilities to retain or gain equity in their current homes, reducing their likelihood of selling their existing homes and purchasing new ones," the report stated.

Auction.com' reported that existing home sales gains have not seen much activity since May, and are expected to be mostly unchanged from October to November.

Earlier this year, the nation's third-largest mortgage lender and the Department of Justice went back and forth in a legal battle accusing the lender of improperly originating and underwriting Federal Housing Administration-insured mortgages. This battle could very well be the lender's motivation to leave the government program alone for good.