“Ain’t I rough enough? Ain’t I tough enough?” Ain’t I rich enough? In love enough?” So Mick Jagger sang. This can apply to many parts of life, but in this case it seems that it is not enough for CRA (Community Reinvestment Act) requirements to apply only to depository institutions. CRA battles within the states are alive and well that apply to non-depository, independent mortgage banks, unfortunately. The MBA has a nice write up on the latest state-specific news. In other challenges for our residential lending biz, the controversy in the normally sleepy world of credit and verification costs continues to confront lenders who in turn pass the costs on to borrowers. As lenders received their January invoices, the cost of pulling multiple credit reports for a given applicant is clear, and troubling. Also troubling is this article on how “Equifax Mark Begor presented at a Goldman Sachs conference for investors, and openly told the investors how much market power his firm has in the business of selling income verification services to creditors. ‘We have meaningful pricing power,’ he said, because ‘only Equifax has that income and employment data.’” (Today’s podcast can be found here and this week’s is sponsored by SimpleNexus, an nCino company and homeownership platform unites the people, systems, and stages of the mortgage process into one seamless, end-to-end solution that spans engagement, origination, closing, and business intelligence. Today’s has an interview with Union Home Mortgage’s CEO Bill Cosgrove on lowering origination costs and raising company culture standards in 2023.)
Source: Mortgage News Daily
