The MReport Webcast: Tuesday 8/4/2015

Goldman Sachs has agreed to pay approximately $270 million to resolve claims that it sold billions of dollars’ worth of faulty residential mortgage-backed securities to investors. Pension funds led by the Health and Welfare Fund of Illinois claim that Goldman misled them as to the quality of the loans underlying the RMBS before the 2008 financial crisis.

This is not the first time Goldman Sachs has faced a lawsuit over the quality of the RMBS it has sold. In August 2014, Goldman agreed to pay $3.15 billion to settle a lawsuit filed by the Federal Housing Finance Agency alleging that Goldman sold toxic RMBS to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, for which FHFA is the conservator. In May, Goldman was ordered by an arbitrator to pay $100 million to National Australia Bank for a conflict of interest regarding MBS sales.

Closing costs on a mortgage loan have lowered over the past year, making purchasing a home less costly.

According to Bankrate.com research, mortgage closing costs dropped 7 percent over the past year and now averages $1,847 dollars on a $200,000 loan. Bankrate found that Hawaii’s average closing costs are the highest in the nation at $2,163, while Ohio hosted the lowest closing costs at $1,613 dollars.