Contracts, Invoices & Legal

New-home purchase activity rose 3.1% year over year, but dropped 7% from October, the Mortgage Bankers Association said. View the full article

Higher unemployment has driven these indications of distress higher but most loans that financial institutions hold in their portfolios are still performing. View the full article

Nonfarm payrolls increased 64,000 in November after declining 105,000 in October, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data out Tuesday. View the full article

Remote work helped fuel migration and erased the loss of rural residents that occurred in the decade prior to the arrival of Covid, Harvard researchers found. View the full article

The threshold regards loans where the annual percentage rate is at least 1.5 percentage points higher than the average prime offer rate on first liens. View the full article

The home purchase market, which competes for consumers with rentals, should remain subdued in 2026 because of high mortgage rates and low affordability. View the full article

Federal Reserve Gov. Stephen Miran said higher goods prices could be the tradeoff for bolstering national security and addressing geoeconomic risks. View the full article

Rising labor and material costs could weigh on final expenses, despite a slower summer for hurricane and tornado claims, according to Verisk. View the full article

The partnership also includes a $50 million equity investment in Finance of America, securing long-term alignment between the companies. View the full article

Confidence among US homebuilders edged up in December as builders continued to deploy sales incentives to motivate buyers. View the full article

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have added billions of dollars of mortgage-backed securities and home loans to their balance sheets in recent months, fueling speculation that they're trying to push down lending rates and boost their profitability ahead of a potential public offering. View the full article

After home equity surged in 2023, average gains slowed last year before falling into negative territory over the past 12 months, Cotality said. View the full article

For 2026, the mortgage industry operating environment will improve, while nonbank financial metrics should be within Fitch's rating criteria sensitivities. View the full article

Rohit Chopra is named senior advisor to the Democratic Attorneys General Association's working group on consumer protection and affordability; Flagstar Bank adds additional wealth-planning capabilities to its private banking division; Chime promotes three members of its executive leadership team; and more in this week's banking news roundup. View the full article

The Department of Housing and Urban Development announced the FHA-insured loan caps for low- and high-cost areas, which are set based on conforming loan limits. View the full article

Kansas City Federal Reserve President Jeffrey Schmid and Chicago Fed President Austan Goolsbee said in statements Friday that their dissents from this week's interest rate decision were spurred by inflation concerns and a lack of sufficient economic data. View the full article

The new monthly reporting rule lists improved accuracy and timeliness of MBS payments among its goals, with implementation planned for February 2026. View the full article

Leading Democrats on the Senate Banking Committee sent a letter to Chair Tim Scott, R-S.C., pointing out the as-yet unsatisfied legal requirement for prudential regulators to appear in Congress semiannually. View the full article

Treasury Secretary Bessent said FSOC is readjusting its approach to avoid stifling growth in moves with implications for capital, technology and mortgages. View the full article

ETHZilla partnered with Zippy to bring manufactured home chattel loans on-chain as tokenized real-world assets. View the full article

Approximately 70% of home purchasers do not get more than one quote in the mortgage process, doing so could reduce their rate by 50 basis points, Zillow said. View the full article

The Federal Reserve Board of Governors voted Wednesday to reappoint 11 sitting regional Fed presidents, without any dissents. The move precludes any effort the White House might have made to pressure the board to deny reappointments. View the full article

On Thursday, prosecutors unsuccessfully tried again to ask a grand jury in a different Virginia court to return an indictment. View the full article

The rent reporting platform says it's helped tenants raise their credit scores by double digits and unlocked $30 billion more in mortgage lending. View the full article