Mortgage rates have moderated after turning in a significant drop last week, according to the Primary Mortgage Market Survey from Freddie Mac.

“The response to the recent decline in mortgage rates is already being felt in the housing market,” said Sam Khater, chief economist for Freddie Mac. After declining for six consecutive months, existing home sales finally rose in October and November and are essentially at the same level as during the summer months. This modest rebound in sales indicates that homebuyers are very sensitive to mortgage rate changes and given the further drop in rates we’ve seen this month, we expect to see a modest rebound in home sales as well.”

Mortgage rates for the week in brief:

• 30-year fixed-rate mortgage averaged 4.62 percent with an average 0.4 point for the week ending December 20, 2018, down from last week when it averaged 4.63 percent. A year-ago at this time, the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage averaged 3.94 percent.
• 15-year fixed-rate mortgage this week averaged 4.07 percent with an average 0.4 point, unchanged from last week. A year-ago at this time, the 15-year fixed-rate mortgage averaged 3.38 percent.
• 5-year Treasury-indexed adjustable rate mortgage averaged 3.98 percent with an average 0.3 point, down from last week when it averaged 4.04 percent. A year-ago at this time, the 5-year adjustable-rate mortgage averaged 3.39 percent.

Millennial’s interest, or lack of interest, in home ownership has been a source of angst for the mortgage industry. Hard data on the subject has been relatively scarce, though that’s changing.

For instance, according to a Lending Tree survey, Millennials in Salt Lake City, Minneapolis and Pittsburgh were more likely to be pursuing homeownership than in the other 50 largest metropolitan areas of the U.S., and 25 percent of mortgage purchase requests between Jan. 1, 2018 and Nov. 25, 2018. came from millennials.

Key findings from the Lending Tree survey are as follows:

• Salt Lake City, Minneapolis and Pittsburgh are the metros where millennials are making up the largest percentage of purchase requests. In Salt Lake City, a majority of the total purchase requests in the area, 51 percent, come from millennials. In Minneapolis and Pittsburgh, 48 percent come from millennials.
• In Tampa, Fla., Las Vegas and Miami, millennials are making the least purchase requests. Only 30 percent of purchase requests came from people under 35 in Tampa.

--That number was only slightly higher in Las Vegas and Miami, where 31 percent and 32 percent of purchase requests came from those under 35.

• San Francisco, San Jose, Calif. and New York are where millennials wait the longest to buy homes, with an average age of 29.6 years old. This compares with an average of 28.7 years old across the remaining 47 largest metros in the U.S.
• Salt Lake City, Louisville, Ky. and Cincinnati are the metros with the lowest average age of buyers under 35. In each of these areas, the average age for potential millennial homebuyers is around 28 years old.
• San Jose, Calif., San Francisco and New York are the places where millennials had the highest average credit scores. In each of these areas, the average millennial homebuyer had a credit score higher than 704. By comparison, the average credit score for millennial homebuyers across the 50 largest MSAs in the country was 656.
• Memphis, Tenn., Birmingham, Ala. and New Orleans are where millennials had the lowest average credit scores. Credit scores in these three areas were 622, 629 and 634 respectively.

Most popular cities among millennial homebuyers include:

Salt Lake City
Share of Purchase Mortgage Requests Coming from Millennials: 51%
Average Requested Loan Amount: $234,391

Minneapolis
Share of Purchase Mortgage Requests Coming from Millennials: 48%
Average Requested Loan Amount: $200,930

Pittsburgh
Share of Purchase Mortgage Requests Coming from Millennials: 48%
Average Requested Loan Amount: $128,316

Least popular cities among millennial homebuyers include:

Tampa, Fla.
Share of Purchase Mortgage Requests Coming from Millennials: 30%
Average Requested Loan Amount: $174,301

Las Vegas
Share of Purchase Mortgage Requests Coming from Millennials: 31%
Average Requested Loan Amount: $224,736

Miami
Share of Purchase Mortgage Requests Coming from Millennials: 32%
Average Requested Loan Amount: $225,536

Workers Credit Union has joined the LoanStreet Inc. lending platform,  which is designed to offers significant cost savings to credit unions by automating manual processes and providing access to its nationwide network of loan buyers and sellers.

“We turned to LoanStreet as an alternative funding source for our fast expanding loan operations.  We simply had more loan demand than capacity on our balance sheet. LoanStreet’s deep network of credit unions quickly solved our needs,” said Tim Smith, CFO at Workers.  “Ultimately, we ended up on-boarding our entire participation book onto LoanStreet’s platform.  Once we saw the benefits of LoanStreet’s ongoing reporting tools, we immediately decided to take full advantage of those services and moved decisively to automate all of our participation reporting.”

LoanStreet’s fully-integrated, online platform brings together a series of tools that help credit unions more effectively share and manage loans at scale. The technology automates the entire reporting process and provides a standardized, consolidated view of every transaction in a user’s portfolio — no matter how many different counterparties it may partner with. These powerful tools provide credit unions with the ability to track their loan portfolio performance with greater accuracy and less administrative overhead.

“Manual processing of participation reports is a deadweight on the credit union industry,” said Ian Lampl, CEO of LoanStreet. “We allow them to more profitably manage and diversify their balance sheet, and free up valuable time to more effectively serve their members.”

ServiceMac, a provider of sub-servicing and portfolio management services, has selected the Black Knight MSP system to support its clients. It will leverage MSP to deliver a scalable and cost-effective servicing process, with a customer focus that complies with regulations.

"We looked at every mortgage servicing platform on the market," said Bob Caruso, president and CEO of ServiceMac. "After significant due diligence, it was clear that MSP was the best option. The long-term commitment Black Knight makes to its clients, and its focus on delivering innovative solutions represents exactly the provider we were looking for."

MSP is a comprehensive, end-to-end servicing system used by financial institutions to service more than 34 million active loans, among the most in the mortgage industry. The system helps clients manage all servicing processes, from loan boarding and payment processing to escrow administration, default management and so forth. Black Knight's technology infrastructure, data transparency and enhancements to meet changing regulatory requirements will help ServiceMac support its clients

"ServiceMac is poised to be a very successful mortgage servicer due to its customer-focused business model, strong leadership and expertise in the industry," said Joe Nackashi, president of Black Knight Inc.