Secondary Market

Gateway Mortgage Group is expanding in the Midwest, recently announcing the opening of a new branch. The company's newly launched location in Omaha, Nebraska, is now Gateway's largest branch in the nation.

Norcom Mortgage and Insurance has announced a new team member, recently hiring a new private mortgage banker and licensed insurance agent for the company.

Existing-home sales rose to 4.62 million at a seasonally adjusted annual rate in April from a downwardly revised March rate of 4.47 million, the National Association of Realtors said Tuesday. Economists had forecast the April sales pace would be 4.66 million. The median price of an existing home climbed 10 percent to $177,400 in April 2011, the strongest year-to-year gain since January 2006. The median price in April reached its highest level since July 2010 when it was $182,100. For-sale homes rose to 2.54 million in April.

In its latest monthly report released Monday, Capital Economics painted a positive picture of the housing market, insisting the market has moved from bottoming-out to recovering. To those wondering whether Capital Economics' positive prophesies are merely a mirage soon to be dispersed much like the short-lived positive movement the market experienced in 2009 and 2010, the analytics firm pointed out a substantial difference between what occurred in 2009-2010 and what is occurring today.

Loan origination software provider Mortgage Builder announced Tuesday that it has reached an agreement to acquire GCC Servicing Systems, a leading loan servicing software provider. GCC is the creator a G/Serv, a mortgage servicing software that automates servicing administration function and is commonly used among mid-tier lenders and mortgage companies, a market sector it shares with Mortgage Builder. The acquisition of GCC will allow Mortgage Builder to offer a new platform for lenders.

Despite some slowdown in housing activity at the end of the first quarter, Fannie Mae projects that home sales will rise and the economy will continue to grow in 2012. Though the first quarter of the year saw substantial housing activity compared to last year, Fannie Mae's internal think tank noticed a drop in momentum late in the quarter. According to the group, this drop may be mirroring many economic indicators and may be a result of the year's unusually warm weather pulling activity slightly forward. Economic growth is at 2.2 percent.

Lawmakers came together with officers of Nationwide Title Clearing to discuss multiple issues in today's residential mortgage industry. In a company statement, NTC said that it hoped to offer the company's support as a resource as members of Congress strive to create industry-wide best practices.

HARP 2.0 is stimulating an uptick in mortgage applications for Bank of the West. The financial institution recently reported notable increases in loan applications during April as homeowners move to capitalize on the government's enhancements to the refinancing initiative. he California-based bank is currently predicting that roughly 20 percent of its loan volume for 2012 will come from refinancing borrowers taking advantage of HARP 2.0. Bank of the West has been savvy in its pursuit of homeowners interested in refinancing.

In Wisconsin, LoanSifter has reason to celebrate, following the company's announcement that its revenues have grown during 22 consecutive quarters. Statistics from LoanSifter, a provider of product eligibility and pricing software solutions for the mortgage banking industry, indicate an 11.6 percent increase in revenue between the final quarter of 2011 and the first quarter of the current year.

The Real Estate Roundtable's new quarterly survey demonstrated a lack of confidence in the outlook for 2012 among commercial real estate executives. According to data from the group's Sentiment Survey, the market improvements seen on a year-over-year basis aren't mitigating concerns surrounding global economic risks and tax issues in the commercial sector.