Reverse mortgage volume saw its biggest monthly increase in August when endorsements jumped 24%, a growth driven by similarly big gains in both the industry’s retail and wholesale origination channels.
Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) endorsements totaled 4,378 units in August, comprising 2,440 retail loans and 1,938 loans on the wholesale side, according to the latest industry data tracked by Reverse Market Insight. Compared to the previous month, August’s numbers represent increases of 20% for retail and 29.5% for wholesale endorsements.
August, which was the first time since April that a single month exceeded 4,000 loans this year, was a welcoming sight for the end of the summer, though this production performance was not sustained the following month.
Looking at the 12 months trailing August 2016, Synergy One Lending Inc.—doing business as Retirement Funding Solutions—added the most retail and wholesale units over the course of this year-long period, with a unit growth of 1,247 retail and 548 wholesale loans.
HighTechLending Inc. also entered the ranks among the top lenders for both retail and wholesale unit growth over the last 12 months. During this time, HighTechLending added 282 retail units and just 51 wholesale units, which was enough to place the company at the fourth-ranked spot among lenders for wholesale unit growth.
Aside from Synergy One Lending and HighTechLending, rounding out the top-five lenders for retail unit growth during the 12 months trailing August were Reverse Mortgage Funding with 831 units, Nationwide Equities Corp. with 706 units and ReverseMortgages.com, which added 431 retail units.
As for wholesale unit growth, the other three top lenders included Longbridge Financial, which added 246 wholesale units to rank second; followed by FirstBank’s 119 wholesale loans; and Land Home Financial Services, which ranked fifth among these lenders with 41 wholesale units.
See how other reverse mortgage lenders performed across retail and wholesale volume channels here.
Written by Jason Oliva
