Now that the noise from the government’s shutdown has quieted, it seems reverse mortgage endorsement volume has officially settled at -35.7%.
According to the latest report from Reverse Market Insight, endorsements in March totaled just 2,573 loans.
The data analytics firm said it calculated multi-month averages to drown out the monthly spikes and dips that resulted when the shutdown halted endorsement activity. Its data suggests that March’s volume is in line with that of recent months, meaning that industry volume has apparently found a new norm.
“Now that we finally have a clean month, it looks like the last five months on average have all been right around this month’s level,” RMI wrote.
Yikes.
It seems none of the major lenders were spared last month, with all of the top 10 experiencing a drop in volume.
Here’s a list of the top 10 and how they fared:
American Advisors Group: -34%
Finance of America Reverse: -42%
One Reverse Mortgage: -39%
Reverse Mortgage Funding: -26%
Synergy One Lending: -35%
Liberty Home Equity Solutions: -.7%
Live Well Financial: -30%
Fairway Independent Mortgage: -35%
HighTechLending: -42%
Longbridge Financial: -34%
RMI took it a step further and compared each lender’s March volume to their December-February average, a calculation designed to eliminate false data from the shutdown.
It found that some lenders had a more respectable month when the data was analyzed in this light, with Liberty coming in at 36% above the three-month average, One Reverse at 16% and Fairway at 13%.
Regionally, every area in the U.S. saw volume decline, leaving RMI to point out that Pacific/Hawaii suffered the least with a 19% decline.
At access the full report, click here.
