Solid Instability
Our shared industry can always depend upon uncertainty.
As interest rates and loan officers jostle back and forth over the next months for their borrowers, here’s a few processing items to keep your eyes on.
Wood
Have you been to Home Depot lately? Supply chain disruption isn’t new news, but brace yourself for sticker shock as you browse down the lumber aisles. According to the National Association of Home Builders, softwood lumber increases in mid-April through mid-September 2020 caused the average new single-family home to increase by $16,148.
Lumber is just part of the equation, and frankly, a small one. According to the MBA, new home sales were up 34.7% when compared to a year ago, running at 827,000 annual, seasonally adjusted units. That’s a reduction of 10.8% from the October pace of 927,000 annual units. MBA stated, “there were 59,000 new home sales in November 2020, a decrease of 15.7 percent from 70,000 new home sales in October.”
Reporting Home Improvement Loans
If the credit repositories report a tradeline with a Home Improvement Loan account type, the S1 credit report will show the tradeline as an “Installment Loan". Previously, S1 credit reports would display the tradeline as a Mortgage. This change was implemented based upon feedback from multiple clients and financial institutions about the representation of their loan offering. Per Fannie Mae requirements, the data provided to Fannie Mae when reissuing a report for underwriting will not be changed as a result of this update.
The IRS
Our friends at the Internal Revenue Service have been busy. PPP funding, economic impact payments, the upcoming filing season, and COVID-19 operational concerns have diverted interest in properly managing inventory and turn-times for the IVES program. IVES is the IRS’ service program for the delivery of IRS Tax Transcripts (i.e., 4506-T requests). The Service is grappling with significant turnover in the last two years as personnel retirement and a hiring freeze from 2011-2018 negatively impact staffing levels. The IRS estimates losing nearly 31% of its workforce over the next five years, or 19,710 federal employees.
The IRS is not forthcoming in its progress, or lack thereof, for API (instant) delivery of tax transcripts. S1, our peers, and industry trade groups are pushing the new Congress and White House for transparency from the IRS on development progress. Deployment of instant transcript access was required by the Taxpayer First Act for YR 2023. This is an important efficiency and fraud mitigation project S1 continues to monitor and advance.
REMINDER: The IRS published a new form, the 4506-C. This new form replaces 4506-T and is required for all new submissions beginning March 1, 2021. Additionally, here’s an update when 2020 tax returns are available from IVES.
The SSA
The mortgage industry uses the Social Security Administration for direct verification of a SSN (CBSV program/form SSA-89). The CBSV program delivers results via API, but until recently has not permitted e-Signature of the SSA-89. In 2020, the SSA launched a limited e-Signature pilot for the SSA-89. The SSA-89 form is the final document within the initial mortgage disclosures to the consumer that is ineligible for e-Signature. S1 continues to monitor and advocate for this necessary improvement from the SSA.
REMINDER: The SSA published a revised SSA-89 form. This revised form is not required by the Social Security Administration until September 30, 2021.
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