Mortgage Banks/Real Estate Credit

To qualify for a $1 million mortgage, Americans typically have to make a down payment of at least 20% of the home’s price. Starting next year, some buyers could put as little as 3% down. The cap for home loans backed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac rises to $1,089,300 next year in a few expensive markets including Los Angeles and New York, up from $970,800, the Federal Housing Finance Agency, or FHFA, said Tuesday. The higher limit means borrowers can qualify for bigger loans without needing to take…

WASHINGTON—The federal government is about to backstop mortgages of more than $1 million for the first time, a reflection of the rapid appreciation in home prices nationally over the past few years even as the mortgage market has recently cooled. The maximum size of home-mortgage loans eligible for backing by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will rise to $1,089,300 next year in high-cost markets, such as parts of California and New York, from $970,800 this year, the Federal Housing Finance Agency said Tuesday. For most parts of…

WASHINGTON—A federal housing agency on Tuesday said its financial reserves have reached record levels and that it was well positioned to weather a mortgage-market downturn.The audit, released by the Federal Housing Administration on Tuesday, likely gives officials room to trim mortgage costs over the coming months as part of a push by the administration to address housing affordability. Low interest rates in 2020 and 2021 and a shortage of new construction pushed home prices to record highs. While prices are expected to…

SYDNEY—Australia, New Zealand and Canada are home to three of the biggest property booms in recent history, having survived the global financial crisis, recession and Covid-19 pandemic. They might have finally met their match, however, at the hands of an unprecedented pace of global monetary tightening. While home prices have been strong around the world for decades, these three stand out. They dodged much of the collapse in prices that hit the U.S. ahead of the global financial crisis, and the booms have gathered even…

The Federal Reserve’s aggressive interest-rate rises to fight inflation are leading the central bank to do something it has never consistently done before: lose money.The central bank’s operating losses have increased in recent weeks because the interest it is paying banks and money-market funds to keep money at the Fed now exceeds the income it earns on some $8.3 trillion in Treasury and mortgage-backed securities it accumulated during bond-buying stimulus programs over the past 14 years. The losses don’t interfere with…

The rate on a 30-year fixed mortgage averaged 7.08% this week, according to a survey of lenders by mortgage giant Freddie Mac. Just seven weeks ago, the rate was below 6%. A year ago it was just over 3%. The last time mortgage rates were this high, the dot-com bubble had recently burst. Rates were on the way down. They were in the middle of a four-decade stretch in which they mostly fell, underpinning the growth of the modern mortgage market and boosting the rate of…

The Federal Housing Finance Agency said Monday that it will require lenders that use credit scores for mortgage underwriting to use scores from both Fair Isaac Corp., FICO 1.52% the creator of FICO credit scores, and its competitor VantageScore Solutions LLC. Until now, mortgage lenders had to gauge most borrowers using only FICO scores if they wanted to sell a loan to Fannie Mae FNMA 1.31% or…

Many Americans who spent years socking away enough money for a down payment to buy a house are now waiting on the sidelines until mortgage rates or home prices drop.  Fannie Mae forecasts that mortgage lenders will complete 49% fewer single-family-home loans in 2022 than 2021. With mortgage rates pushing 7% and home prices still high, buyers often park their down-payment money in low-yield accounts, financial advisers say. While relatively safe, the funds often collect more dust than…

U.S. mortgage rates jumped to their highest level in more than two decades. The average 30-year fixed mortgage rate hit 6.92% this week, according to a survey of lenders released Thursday by mortgage giant Freddie Mac. Many lenders are offering rates well over 7%. A year ago, the average rate was 3.05%. The most recent jump, from 6.66% a week ago, took the rate above the peak of the last financial crisis. The benchmark has climbed nearly 2…

Carlos Castañeda and Genesis Martusciello fled Venezuela in the middle of the previous decade, arriving in Miami with little money and few prospects but in search of a better life. Within a few years, the young couple had access to millions of dollars. They achieved their sudden wealth through what Florida real-estate attorneys call one of the boldest real-estate frauds the U.S. has ever seen.…