Mortgage Refinance Boom! Is 2003 Here Again?

Today's Wall Street Journal, Amy Hoak talks about MBA's survey of mortgage applications for the prior week.  The survey showed a 12.8% rise mostly from mortgage refinance applications.

Recordings of mortgage deeds confirm a steady month over month rise in the number of refinance mortgage originations during 2009.  With fixed mortgage rates falling below 5 percent,  interest rates are below the rates of the 2003 refi boom.  We do not expect mortgage originations in this current refi boom to approach the levels seen in 2003.  During 2003 the refinances included large equity extractions.  This time around, most  mortgage refinances are used to replace existing mortgage debt at lower cost. Less "cash out" refinancing is taking place as compared with 2003. In other words. these refinances are real mortgage refinances. Homeowners who refinance are improving their cash flow and their net worth.

Using recordings of mortgage deeds of trust at county court houses, MortgageDataWeb ranked the top conventional refinance mortgage lenders and the top FHAVA (Government Insured) mortgage refinance lenders based upon data collected through July for 2009.

Conventional Refinance Mortgage Leading Lenders

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FHAVA Refinance Mortgage Leading Lenders

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It must be great to be a mortgage lender still standing in 2009!

In Oregon Wells Fargo Gets More Mortgage Market Share

Wells Fargo has more than doubled their market share for conventional mortgage originations in Oregon. Their market share approached 24 percent in July. Last year, during a very weak mortgage market, Wells Fargo had roughly 12 percent of conventional mortgages in Oregon. The chart above show the market share growth of Wells Fargo.

Now you can view Wells Fargo’s mortgage origination performance and the market share performance of other leading mortgage lenders using MortgageDataWeb. The Test Drive feature includes current mortgage data for selected areas. At MortgageDataWeb's Test Drive site, users can obtain up to date market share reports by metropolitan area, county, or town. Mortgage types include conventional, FHA, and VA mortgages. This week the test drive areas include Illinois and Oregon.

Mortgage lenders, marketing managers, housing finance researches, or anyone requiring mortgage origination data in geographic area markets will find this site informative, useful, and easy to use. The geographic areas included in the test drive are limited subject to change. The test drive allows you to observe the quality of mortgage data and reports, and the ease of use of MortgageDataWeb's mortgage market share data and reporting features.

http://mortgagedataweb.com/MDWelcome/TestDrive.aspx

Test Drive Mortgage Market Share Reports for Arizona and Connecticut

MortgageDataWeb provides mortgage lender market share data and statistics for mortgage markets across the nation. A Test Drive feature includes current mortgage data for selected areas. At MortgageDataWeb's Test Drive site, users can obtain up to date market share reports by metropolitan area, county, or town. Mortgage types include conventional, FHA, and VA mortgages.  This weeks test drive areas include Arizona and Connecticut.

Mortgage lenders, marketing managers, housing finance researches, or anyone requiring mortgage origination data in geographic area markets will find this site informative, useful, and easy to use. The geographic areas included in the test drive are limited subject to change. The test drive allows you to observe the quality of mortgage data and reports, and the ease of use of MortgageDataWeb's mortgage market share data and reporting features.
 
http://mortgagedataweb.com/MDWelcome/TestDrive.aspx

Are Mortgage Markets Concentrated or Competitive? Look at Virginia

This weeks' National Mortgage News (September 7, 2009) top residential originator summaries suggest that Wells Fargo and Bank of America accounted for 44% of all residential funding. If this is true then where is the Justice Department on antitrust law enforcement? These types of market shares potentially give these lenders pricing and service powers to squeeze out the competitors. Well not so fast!


We used mortgage data for Virginia (later this can be extended too many more markets) and compared the competitive landscape today to the Virginia mortgage market in 2006. Virginia is a typical mortgage market for this experiment. 2006 was a good year to compare because the major turmoil in mortgage markets showed their ugly face in 2007. We calculated the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index (HHI) as a statistic to measure mortgage market concentration. Conventional purchase and refinance mortgage recordings for the first six months of 2006 was compared to 2009.

In 2006 the HHI value was 235 indicated a very competitive mortgage market having dozens of mortgage lender participants. In 2009, HHI climbed to 552. This is hardly a concentrated mortgage market and values of 552 would not be possible with 2 lenders having 44 percent of the market. No way Jose!

Even with mega mergers of Countrywide / Bank of America and Wachovia/ Wells Fargo, we still have competitive mortgage markets. It is true that the markets are much less competitive than they were just a few years ago but they are still competitive.

Howard Hanna Financial Now Top FHA/VA Originator in Cleveland Metro

Howard Hanna Financial Services now leads the FHAVA mortgage market in Cleveland Ohio.  For the year to date period ending July 2009, Howard Hanna has captured 7.65% of the market with $73.5 million in FHAVA mortgage originations.  During the same period last year, Howard Hanna had a market share of 5.83 percent with $39.5 million in originations.

J.P. Morgan Chase, who led the Cleveland metropolitan area market last year appears to have dropped off their FHAVA lending.  J.P. Morgan currently ranks 18th in the Cleveland FHAVA mortgage market.

Mortgage Market Share and Lender Rankings: Test Drive MortgageDataWeb

MortgageDataWeb provides mortgage lender market share data and statistics for mortgage markets across the nation.  A Test Drive feature includes current mortgage data for selected areas.  At MortgageDataWeb's Test Drive site, users can obtain up to date market share reports by metropolitan area, county, or town. Mortgage types include conventional, FHA, and VA mortgages.

Mortgage lenders, marketing managers, housing finance researches, or anyone requiring mortgage origination data in geographic area markets will find this site informative, useful, and easy to use.  The geographic areas included in the test drive are limited subject to change.  The test drive allows you to observe the quality of mortgage data and reports, and the ease of use of  MortgageDataWeb's mortgage market share data and reporting features.

Mortgage Loan Modifications, How is Your Lender Doing?

Bank of America, Wells Fargo, CitiMortgage, JPMorgan Chase, and many other mortgage loan servicers have beefed up their staff resources to process the backlog of mortgage loan modification requests.  Do you think these banks are providing adequate services? Are they being fair their mortgagor customers? How about the investors in these mortgages?  What are your first hand experiences in loan workouts with these or other lenders?