WASHINGTON– The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) and the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) have published updated loan-level data for public use collected through the National Survey of Mortgage Originations (NSMO). The data provide insights into borrowers' experiences obtaining residential mortgages, the organizations noted.
Since 2014, FHFA and CFPB have sent surveys each quarter to borrowers who had recently obtained mortgages. These surveys gather feedback on borrowers’ experiences during the process of getting a mortgage, their perceptions of the mortgage market, and their future expectations, the agencies said.
The most recent release adds two additional years of new mortgage data through 2019.
Key Highlights
According to the CFPB and FHFA, key highlights of the data include:
- The percentage of survey respondents who reported not being concerned about qualifying for a mortgage during the application process increased somewhat from 2018 to 2019 (from 48 to 51% for home purchase mortgages and 57 to 66% for refinances).
- The percentage of survey respondents who reported a paperless online mortgage process being important in choosing the mortgage lender/broker remained relatively high and unchanged from 2018 to 2019 (40% for home purchase mortgages and 44% for refinances).
- The percentage of survey respondents who reported applying for a mortgage through a mortgage broker increased from 2018 to 2019 (from 42 to 46% for home purchase mortgages and 30 to 38% for refinances). On the other hand, the percentage of survey respondents who applied directly through a bank or credit union decreased from 2018 to 2019 (from 54 to 49 for home purchase mortgages and 67 to 61 for refinances).
Setting A Baseline
“The NSMO data…sets a baseline about how borrowers viewed the mortgage process just prior to the COVID crisis,” said FHFA Deputy Director Lynn Fisher. “Releasing this data to the public helps promote an understanding of the specific challenges and successes that borrowers experienced during the mortgage process.”
The NSMO is a component of the National Mortgage Database (NMDB), the first comprehensive repository of detailed mortgage loan information designed to support policymaking and research efforts and to help regulators better understand emerging mortgage and housing market trends.