News

Ally has satisfied its consumer relief obligations required under last year's National Mortgage Settlement (NMS), according to settlement monitor Joseph Smith Jr.

Citing changes in regulatory reform due to Dodd-Frank as the driving factor, Edward Jones Mortgage, based in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, will close its doors permanently in April. The office has been writing residential mortgages since 1998 and ceased writing them in January.

In Pittsburgh, PNC Financial Services Group's board of directors elected president William S. Demchak as director and announced that he will succeed chairman James E. Rohr as CEO. The board held the election in response to Rohr's desire to step down as CEO at the company's 2013 Annual Meeting of Shareholders on April 23 and his intention to retire from the company and the board next year.

Ellie Mae, a leading provider of enterprise-level, on-demand automated solutions for the residential mortgage industry, announced that Jonathan Corr has been promoted to company president. In his role, Corr will be responsible for managing Ellie Mae's day-to-day operations. He will also continue to serve as COO and will keep reporting to Sig Anderman, the company's chairman and CEO.

Well housing activity remains near historical lows, Freddie Mac is taking a more optimistic view: There's still plenty of room to grow. This glass-half-full viewpoint was reflected in the GSE's forecast for housing in 2013, especially for housing starts, which are projected to increase to 950,000 units this year--22 percent higher than 2012 levels. The GSE also expects prices to increase 3 percent in 2013 and 2014, while sales are forecast to rise to an annual rate of 5.45 million and 5.80 million, respectively.

Deloitte's Consumer Spending Index declined for the third straight month in January, the company reported. The index, which tracks consumer cash flow as an indicator of future spending, fell to 3.87 from a previous reading of 3.93. Patricia Buckley, director of economic policy and analysis at Deloitte and author of the monthly index, explained the decrease is "primarily due to slowing increases of new home prices," though gradual improvements in initial unemployment claims and real wages may reverse the downward trend in the future.

Conditions are ripe for home values in 2013, according to January national housing data collected by Realtor.com.

In Michigan, Flagstar Bancorp, Inc., announced an agreement to sell the assets of DocVelocity, its document imaging business for mortgage lenders, to Capsilon, a provider of cloud-based sharing, imaging, and collaboration services for mortgage lenders.

The GAO revealed it considers the agency to be a "high risk" program "due to [its] greater vulnerability to fraud, waste, abuse and mismanagement or the need for transformation."

One real estate consulting firm has noticed a substantial divide between housing starts and completions and points to labor as the major factor.