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The housing market is showing no signs of slowing down as new single-family home sales in May 2015 rose 2.2 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 546,000, the highest rate since February 2008, according to new residential sales data released jointly today by the U.S. Census Bureau and HUD.

Lenders can expect to see some changes and clarification with how the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) will handle defect taxonomy and their guidelines. Today, the FHA posted its Single Family Loan Quality Assessment Methodology or “Defect Taxonomy”, which explains how FHA intends to categorize loan defects found in Single Family FHA endorsed loans today.

Stewart Title Guaranty's operations group, which supports the company’s growing network of independent title agencies, has announced in a press release that Deloitte & Touche LLP (Deloitte & Touche) will now offer its compliance attestation to Stewart’s independent title and settlement agents.

Borrowers who owe more money to banks than their home is worth is slowing decreasing, however more than half of these borrowers are stuck in an underwater free fall with little to no hope of resurfacing. According to Zillow’s first quarter Negative Equity Report released today, although the negative equity rate is falling, more than half or 4 million homeowners owed the bank at least 20 percent more than the worth of their home.

McLean Mortgage Corporation has announced it has hired Chad Freeman as the Bethesda, Maryland office branch manager, according to a recent press release. McLean provides turn-key service to real estate agents and customers and was recently was named the 6th Largest Mortgage Lender in the Washington, DC area by the Washington Business Journal.

Today, Ocwen Financial Corporation announced that it will use payments connected with previous mortgage servicing rights (MSRs) sales to pay down $53.2 million of its senior secured term loan, according to the company’s recent 8-K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). As of now, Ocwen still has approximately $939.4 million left outstanding under its senior secured term loan.

A new survey of housing attitudes released by the MacArthur Foundation found that a majority of Americans believe the country is still not past the housing crisis that began seven years ago. The 2015 How Housing Matters Survey found that three in five Americans believe we are “still in the middle” of the housing crisis or “the worst part is yet to come” of the crisis.

American Tax and Property Reporting, Inc. (ATPR), announced in a press release that Shannon Cobb has been hired to join its leadership team as EVP reporting to President, Alok Datta. ATPR, a subsidiary of SLK Global, is a provider of technology focused solutions for the real estate and settlement services industry.

Democratic Members on the Senate Banking and House Financial Services Committees announced in a press release that new legislation will provide targeted relief to small financial institutions and protection for consumers. This legislation was introduced in both the House of Representatives and the United States Senate and has the unanimous support of Democratic Members of the respective committees.

The Federal Home Loan Bank of Des Moines (FHLB Des Moines) announced today in a press release that it will merge with the Federal Home Loan Bank of Seattle (FHLB Seattle). More details concerning this new combination will be included in a related Form 8-K that FHLB Des Moines will file with the Securities and Exchange Commission.