Pango Group hired Joe Curtis as EVP of sales to join the family of escrow and financial service companies.

Lender Processing Services, Inc. introduced the web-based Workout Interaction Tool (WIT), which provides data from its MSP servicing system to and from Fannie Mae's Servicing Management Default Underwriter (SMDU) platform.

Ally Financial Inc. announced an agreement that settles any existing and potential claims from Residential Capital--its bankrupt mortgage subsidiary--and ResCap creditors, according to an announcement Tuesday.

KeyBank Real Estate Capital, the commercial real estate business unit of KeyCorp, entered into agreements with Bank of America and Berkadia Commercial Mortgage that will lead it to become one of the nation's largest commercial mortgage servicers.

In a recent report, Jed Kolko, Trulia's chief economist, provided two reasons to explain the link between employment growth and housing.

In the first quarter of this year, Fannie Mae reported pre-tax income of $8.1 billion, the largest in its history.

Including distressed sales, home prices rose 10.5 percent year-over-year in March, marking the biggest annual gain in seven years, according to CoreLogic's Home Price Index (HPI). "For the first time since March 2006, both the overall index and the index that excludes distressed sales are above 10 percent year over year," said Dr. Mark Fleming, chief economist for CoreLogic. "The pace of appreciation has been accelerating throughout 2012 and so far in 2013 leading into the home buying season."

The Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP) continued to bolster refinance numbers in February, according to a refinance report from the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA). Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac reported 97,738 HARP refinances throughout the month, bringing the total number of HARP refinances (from the program's inception) to approximately 2.3 million. FHFA also reported HARP refinances accounted for 21 percent of total refinance volume in February.

New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman revealed plans Monday to take legal action against Bank of America and Wells Fargo for allegedly violating terms under the national mortgage settlement reached in February 2012. The AG's office also revealed Schneiderman sent a letter last week to the settlement monitor Joseph Smith and to each member of the Monitoring Committee notifying them of his intention to sue the banks if the committee does not act.

Ocwen Financial Corporation reported $45.1 million in net income in this year's first quarter, more than double the $19.3 million recorded at the same time last year.