Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) endorsements dropped by 13.8% to 2,842 loans for the month of November 2019, a decrease from the spike in activity observed the prior month with the majority of the top 10 lenders recording endorsement decreases. This is according to the November HECM Lenders report compiled by Reverse Market Insight (RMI).
Every major region in the country recorded drops in endorsement activity in November, though in most cases the drops were marginal when directly compared with October activity. The largest recorded drop comes from the Pacific/Hawaii region, which recorded 118 less endorsements in November than it did in October, though it is still the largest region for reverse mortgage activity in the country. The Southeast/Caribbean region drop was far less sharp, decreasing by only 20 endorsements compared with October figures.
All the top 10 lenders, save for one, recorded drops in their endorsement volume. The sole exception is Finance of America Reverse (FAR), which recorded 32 more endorsements in November when directly compared with its October figure.
While it was still technically listed among the top 10 lenders for year-to-date numbers for several months after it closed its doors, shuttered lender Live Well Financial has now dropped to the eleventh-ranked lender for 2019 in year-to-date figures.
As noted previously, leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate will have to take action sometime this month to avoid another partial federal government shutdown at the end of the year, as seen in December 2018-February 2019. On November 21, the House and Senate passed a stopgap spending bill that delayed an additional debate on the federal budget, which was quickly signed into law by the president. Lawmakers and the White House now have until December 20 to reach a new funding deal for the next year.
If Congress fails to act by that point, it’s possible that a new shutdown could take place at the exact same point in time that the last one did, and for the same overarching reasons. However, the issue of the federal budget could be further complicated by the larger debate surrounding the active impeachment inquiry into President Trump being conducted by the House of Representatives.
Read the HECM Lenders report at RMI.
