The MReport Webcast: Wednesday 5/6/2015

According to the March 2015 CoreLogic Home Price Index, home prices, including distressed sales, have increased by 5.9 percent year-over-year in March 2015. Month-over-month, prices including distressed sales increased 2 percent from February 2015 to March 2015. Twenty-seven states plus the District of Columbia were at or near 10 percent of their highest prices, including distressed sales. Since January 1976 when CoreLogic did its first HPI, seven states—Colorado, Nebraska, New York, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas and Wyoming—reached new home price highs.

Values for the CoreLogic HPI Forecast are taken from state-level forecasts’ known directories according to the amount of owned and occupied homes for each state. The Forecast says that home prices, including distressed sales, are expected to increase by 0.8 percent from March 2015 to April 2015 and by 5.1 percent from March 2015 to March 2016. Not including distressed sales, home prices are projected to increase by 0.7 percent from March 2015 to April 2015 and by 4.7 percent from March 2015 to March 2016.

Interthinx released its quarterly Mortgage Fraud Risk Report, revealing that the National Mortgage Fraud Risk Index is 101 for Q4 2014, a 3 percent increase from the previous quarter and the exact same as Q4 2013. Mark Fleming, chief economist at First American Financial Corporation says that there has been a large decline since 2013 in employment and income related fraud due to the implementation of QM and the Ability-to-Repay rules, which is causing underwriters to pay much closer attention to employment and income statements in mortgage applications.