The US Department of Housing and Urban Development published Mortgagee Letter 2009-53 which clarifies how fees and charges for Federal Housing Administration (FHA)-insured loans must be disclosed on the new Good Faith Estimate and HUD-1 Settlement Statement. According to the ML, HUD is removing the origination fee limit to 1 percent of the mortgage amount [...]

The reverse mortgage industry has been through more changes than anyone could’ve predicted over the last 12 months and 2010 will bring more of the same. As the year comes to a close, take a look at the top 10 reverse mortgage news stories of 2009 (based on page views):

Star Union Dai-Ichi Life Insurance Ltd, an Indian insurance company owned jointly by the state-run Bank of India, Union Bank of India, and Japan’s Dai-Ichi Mutual Life Insurance Co., announced India’s first reverse mortgage annuity product today. Previously in India, when a reverse mortgage was taken out, the bank would pay the borrower interest for [...]

A survey released by Harris Interactive compromised of 2,029 adults found that seniors are spending a significant amount of time online. While still lacking behind other age groups, seniors over the age of 65 spend an average of 8 hours a week online, with only 4% of those surveyed saying they are online less than [...]

The Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2009 that passed the House earlier this month, contains a provision that calls on the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to provide grants for states to investigate and prosecute misleading and fraudulent marketing practices. HR 4173 also allows those grants to be used to develop educational [...]

Fannie Mae (FNMA) has updated its reverse mortgage loan application (1009) and is requiring that lenders use the new form starting July 1, 2010.  The GSE updated the 1009 to comply with Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) and Federal Housing Administration (FHA) requests to capture additional data during the loan origination/application process and loan delivery.