The Federal Housing Finance Agency today proposed updated standards that mortgage lenders would have to meet in order to sell loans to or service loans on behalf of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The proposed update includes new requirements for the servicing of Ginnie Mae mortgages, and comments on the changes are due in 60 days.
Under the requirements, which were last updated in 2015, sellers and servicers would be required to maintain a base net worth of $2.5 million plus 35 basis points of the unpaid principal balance for Ginnie Mae servicing and 25 basis points of the unpaid principal balance for all other 1-to-4-family loans serviced. Depository institutions would continue to rely on their prudential regulatory standards to meet the GSEs’ capital and liquidity requirements.
Nonbanks’ minimum capital ratio would remain unchanged, while their minimum liquidity would rise from 3.5 basis points of their total agency servicing to 4 basis points for GSE servicing and 10 basis points for Ginnie Mae servicing. Their incremental liquidity charge for non-performing assets would be 300 basis points for the portion of agency NPLs over 4% of agency servicing. Unused but available portions of committed servicing advance lines of credit would no longer be allowed to meet minimum liquidity requirements.
