AHMSI may add correspondent origination channel

WL Ross & Co., a private equity firm run by billionaire Wilbur Ross, may be looking to expand American Home Mortgage Servicing with a correspondent mortgage origination channel. WL Ross & Co. is majority owner of the Coppell, Texas-based mortgage servicing firm and the $85 billion in subprime mortgages it services, according to statistics reported by HousingWire in late 2010. When asked about the firm’s future beyond its primary focus of subprime servicing, Philippa Brown, assistant vice president of corporate communications for American Home Mortgage Servicing, said, “We are exploring expansion into loan production. It is an important component of our diversification and growth strategy for the company.” Beyond that, American Home Mortgage declined to comment. However, Wilbur Ross has shown a propensity in the past year to look for greener pastures on the origination side. Earlier this year, HousingWire spoke with Ross about his private equity firm choosing to invest up to $100 million in mortgage originator Capital Markets Cooperative. At the time, Ross told HousingWire, “From the point of view of American Home, servicing is a good business, though it has gotten complicated lately with robo-signing and all those issues. Yet, there is one aspect that is tricky. When the home is sold, you generally lose the servicing. So there is a natural tendency for the revenue base to run down. We’ve been planning from the beginning on finding some way to solve the problem of origination.” Write to: Kerri Panchuk.