News

RockTop Partners, a Texas-based buyer of residential loan portfolios, has selected RIO Genesis as its technology platform provider, the software firm announced.

Based on weekly application data released by the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA), macroeconomics firm Capital Economics calculated a 0.3 percent increase in mortgage applications last month. The meager uptick compares to a 10.1 percent surge in October.

The United States Senate voted Tuesday to confirm the nomination of former Treasury assistant secretary Nani Coloretti to her new post as deputy secretary of HUD. Coloretti's confirmation comes months after the Senate confirmed Julian Castro as HUD secretary.

Single-family home sales in the state totaled 4,404 in October, marking a 1.4 percent increase over October 2013's total of 4,345, the Boston-based Warren Group reported recently. It was the first annual increase since June.

In a report on Tuesday, the Commerce Department estimated construction spending throughout the month at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $971 billion, an increase of 1.1 percent over September's revised estimate of $960.3 billion. A large share of October's increase came in spending on residential projects.

The StoneHill Group, a mortgage solutions firm headquartered in Atlanta, recently named mortgage industry veteran Patricia Hamilton as business development manager.

In his 2015 outlook, Zillow's chief economist, Dr. Stan Humphries, predicts millennials will take on a much greater presence in the housing market, overtaking Generation X as the largest group of homebuyers.

Real estate information firm CoreLogic reported a 0.5 percent monthly uptick and a 6.1 percent annual gain in its October Home Price Index (HPI). As of October, 27 states and the District of Columbia were at or within 10 percent of their home price peaks, and nine had achieved new record highs.

The balance of Fannie Mae's gross mortgage portfolio stood at $436.2 billion at the end of October, representing a compound annualized rate decline of 5 percent from September, according to the mortgage giant's latest monthly volume summary.

The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan consumer sentiment index saw its fourth straight monthly gain last month, climbing to a reading of 88.8. The final index fell in between October's final value of 86.4 and a mid-month reading of 89.4 and was once again the highest level since July 2007.