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PLTA is proud to offer ALTA News to members
ALTA News: Headlines and news from various media sources, keeping you
"in the know" about issues impacting business and the real estate and
mortgage markets.
The mortgage-finance giant Fannie Mae will soon accept so-called crypto-backed mortgages for the first time, the latest expansion of cryptocurrencies into mainstream financial transactions.
Mobile homes themselves do not appreciate as quickly as single-family homes, but the land they sit on can be as valuable an investment as a site-built home.
In rural Mason County, KY, an unnamed Fortune 100 company’s grand plan to build a billion-dollar data center has run into a formidable obstacle: farmers who say they will not sell their land at any price. The clash is turning this normally quiet corner of northern Kentucky into a flashpoint in the national debate over the massive data centers needed to power the artificial intelligence boom.
The high-profile fight between real estate giants Compass and Zillow is over — but the larger battle over control of home listings is not. Compass dropped its federal lawsuit on March 18, 2026 after Zillow eased up on one of their policies, nicknamed the “Zillow Ban.”
Private investment firms of the ultra-wealthy are snapping up domestic real estate as the market’s recovery continues to stall, family office investors told Inside Wealth.
Housing costs are placing the greatest strain on buyers in California and New York, home to many of the least affordable counties in the U.S., according to the latest data from ATTOM, a provider of property data and real estate analytics. Among the 25 counties where major monthly home expenses took up the largest share of residents’ wages, 14 were in California, four in New York, three in New Jersey and two in Hawaii.
The Federal Reserve’s rate decisions dominate financial headlines, but the actual impact on your mortgage is more nuanced than most coverage suggests. After cutting its benchmark rate three times in 2025, the Fed has signaled a more cautious approach for 2026. Here’s what that means for three different groups of homeowners and buyers — and the specific moves each should consider.
Younger generations are typically associated with wanting to live a big-city lifestyle, but the high cost of housing on the coasts is driving Gen Z to consider other options.
Affordability has gone from being a dry financial term to an all-purpose hot button. Groceries, health care, child care, cars, gas — you name it, and affordability is attached to it these days. And then there’s housing, one of the stickiest issues in America’s affordability discussions. On March 12, the U.S. Senate passed a massive housing bill addressing affordability and supply, mostly of single-family homes.
On March 20, the court ruled that an escrow company did nothing wrong when it released a defaulting buyer's entire deposit to the seller. The decision vacated an intermediate appellate court ruling that had found enough of a dispute to send the case to trial. The Supreme Court said no – the escrow company followed the agreement, and that was the end of it.
Pig butchering victims are the subject of prolonged grooming by fraudsters. The fraudsters typically initiate contact through social media, dating apps, or messaging platforms and build trust, often in a romantic context, over weeks or months. They then introduce a purported investment opportunity, often involving cryptocurrency or foreign exchange. After victims make an initial transfer, they are then shown fabricated "returns," which induce them to escalate their investments until, finally, the scammer disappears with their funds.
For Houston mother-of-two Raysall Wiggins, President Donald Trump's crackdown on institutional homebuyers is a deeply personal victory after she was outbid 20 times by investors during a grueling two-year search for her first home. Although a new report from Realtor.com shows that corporate buying activity has a shrinking footprint, accounting for just 1% of all single-family home purchases nationwide and is deeply clustered, large-scale investors' presence can feel overwhelming in specific neighborhoods as they compete with individual home shoppers like Wiggins.
Mortgage rates rose last week to the highest level since last fall, and that pushed mortgage demand off a cliff. Total mortgage application volume dropped 10.5% last week from the previous week, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s seasonally adjusted index. The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages with conforming loan balances, $832,750 or less, increased to 6.43% from 6.30%, with points rising to 0.65 from 0.63, including the origination fee, for loans with a 20% down payment.
While the commercial mortgage-backed securities market has been going gangbusters of late, investors seem to be saying there is such a thing as too much of a good thing. “Investors are showing some fatigue, as issuance has been very high,” said Lea Overby, head of U.S. CMBS research at Barclays.
Unused church property is emerging as a viable housing supply source as two slow-moving trends converge: declining church attendance and an escalating housing affordability crunch. Many congregations have surplus land but tighter budgets, while cities are short on well-located sites for new homes. States and local governments are rewriting zoning rules to make it easier for churches and other faith institutions to build housing on land they already own – often with affordability requirements.
A sprawling “house stealing” operation allegedly targeted elderly homeowners and pulled in roughly $17 million over several years. Regulators and industry groups have been warning that deed and refinance fraud are rising risks for lenders and investors. A Milliman study for the American Land Title Association found fraud and forgery claims on mortgage refinances climbed to more than 40% of total title insurer losses and expenses.
The Closing Shop in Gloucester Court House, Va. recently received Old Republic National Title’s Shining Star Award for Operational Excellence. This honor is awarded to the top 15 percent of title agencies in Virginia, reflecting the company’s operational excellence and strong professional relationships built between the agency and its underwriting partners. The Closing Shop is a member of ALTA.
While the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage recently dipped below 6%, adjustable-rate mortgages are offering homebuyers their biggest discount in nearly four years. The average homebuyer would save $150 per month by using an ARM instead of a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage, according to a new report from Redfin that analyzed 30-year rates compared with 7/6 ARMs as of March 16.
American borrowers has faced a growing clash between mortgage rules and the reality of a hardening insurance market. With premiums at record levels in many states and some carriers retreating from high-risk areas, condo associations and rural homeowners have increasingly struggled to find coverage that meets Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac requirements without blowing up monthly payments.
Mortgage fraud continues to be a growing problem across the entire industry, but it has been especially problematic in the commercial and multifamily segments. Private lending trade groups like the National Private Lenders Association (NPLA) have put together a fraud watch list to identify and root out fraudsters from the private lending space. This has become even more important after fraud issues were detected in both Baltimore and Philadelphia, among other metro areas.
The United States' high court turned down a case involving a former biweekly mortgage-payment services firm that has been fighting a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau penalty for a decade. The Supreme Court this week declined to hear an appeal from Nationwide Biweekly Administration, which has battled the regulator since 2015.
U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) has opened an investigation into Fair Isaac Corp. (FICO)’s pricing practices in the mortgage industry and is urging Federal Trade Commission Chairman Andrew Ferguson to do the same. FICO dominates the credit scoring market for mortgage lenders, largely due to decades of exclusive acceptance for loans sold to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Although the Federal Housing Finance Agency announced last year that competitor VantageScore 4.0 would be accepted as an alternative to Classic FICO, industry sources say the option is not yet operational.
The age of first-time homebuyers is rising in expensive states like California but dropping in more affordable Midwestern and Southern markets, as high prices, elevated mortgage rates, and limited housing supply reshape who can buy. While one analysis pegs the median age at 32, other data suggests buyers are getting older, with some estimates reaching a record 40.
Oil prices are rising, supply chains are straining and policymakers are proceeding with caution—but for now, the U.S. economy continues to hold its ground. Even amid the Iran War and the oil disruptions stemming from it, economists see only a modest risk of recession this year, according to a new survey from The Wall Street Journal.
When floodwaters rushed through their rural Clay County property in February 2025, the Salmons family didn’t apply for federal disaster aid. The storm destroyed their farm equipment and the bridge to their home, but they knew others were hurting more. “So many people lost their lives, lost their whole homes. It didn’t get in our house. It wouldn’t have been right to file,” Sharon Salmons says. “We’re too old to farm now anyway.”
A former US Mortgage employee is suing the lender for failing to protect his personal data in a hack last year, which the company has said it took swift action to address. Richard Bernich sued the Long Island-based company in federal court for negligence, the latest data breach suit against a mortgage player following a cybersecurity incident.
The executive order does not cover new ground for settlement services providers, Elizabeth Blosser, chief strategy, communications and innovation officer for the ALTA said. "From the outset, ALTA has prioritized building strong safeguards into digital closing frameworks," Blosser continued. In particular, we have championed RON legislation that incorporates rigorous identity proofing, secure credential analysis and robust anti-fraud measures." ALTA's primary focus is protecting consumers and combating the growing threat of real estate fraud, although convenience is an important benefit of digital mortgages and RON.
Today, U.S. bank regulators are set to formally unveil softened new draft capital rules, a move that could ease pressure on large Wall Street banks and potentially free up billions of dollars for lending, share buybacks, and dividends. Capital levels at larger regional banks would fall by 5.2%, while banks below $100 billion in assets would enjoy a ?7.8% decline in their capital requirements under the proposals.
Home flippers ended 2025 with far less cushion than during the pandemic boom. Rising acquisition costs and stubbornly high prices pushed gross returns on US flips back toward Great Recession levels, according to ATTOM’s year-end U.S. Home Flipping Report. Flipped properties made up 7.4% of all home sales, with 297,045 single-family homes and condos resold within 12 months of purchase. That's the lowest annual volume since 2020.
Jim and Lindy Kennedy listed their three-bedroom house in Bluffton, S.C., in February 2025, but few buyers bothered to look at it. When a friend knew someone looking for a six-month rental, they decided to lease the house and try the market again in 2026.
Spring is traditionally the busiest season for home sales, and while this year’s market dynamics have shifted strongly in favor of buyers, broader forces in the economy are creating significant challenges. The most important factor in any season is mortgage rates. They were expected to be lower this year, as the Federal Reserve dropped its lending rate to counter inflation, but the war with Iran has turned that on its head.
Online privacy is a problem as old as the internet itself, and it's a well-known trade-off to using tech that makes life easier. Companies collect tons of data through various apps and services, and use that data either as a product to sell to third parties or for targeted advertising. There are things you can do to reduce the risk, but even with the best practices, you can't stop all of it. With that said, some apps are worse about it than others, and knowing which apps are gathering the most data is the first step in protecting your privacy.
South Florida’s luxury real estate is booming, with million-dollar home sales climbing at their fastest pace in nearly two decades and Palm Beach County leading the way. Year-to-date sales of million-dollar homes in South Florida have risen to an all-time high since 2008, with 2,040 sales as of February 2026, according to the Miami Association of Realtors.
The Senate-passed bipartisan housing legislation faces an uphill path to passage in the House of Representatives, where Republicans in the majority are fearful of being forced into a bad deal. The Senate voted 89-10 to pass the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, which would lessen some government regulations on housing and incentivize state and local governments to ease land-use regulations. But some in the House are feeling like they are being jammed by the Senate and want changes to the legislation before it reaches the desk of President Donald Trump.
Officially, the Federal Reserve is still focused on when and by how much to cut interest rates again. Unofficially, the vibes have changed. The Fed’s next move might be to raise rates. Emphasis on “might.” This isn’t the Fed’s or my personal baseline scenario. But three factors are raising the risk.
The March 2026 ICE Mortgage Monitor Report has been published by Intercontinental Exchange, Inc. (ICE), showing that total mortgage originations reached an estimated 1.44 million in Q4, the highest quarterly total since Q3 2022, as servicer retention reached an eight-year high and lending reached its highest level in three and a half years due to a spike in refinance activity.
After seeing an uptick in sales last year, the nationwide new home market experienced a sharp drop in new home sales activity in January, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s New Residential Sales report released on Thursday. Economists say that this could be a momentary drop due to extreme weather conditions, or that the sales figures could be revised next month.
American homebuyers are about to get a break. New rules for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgages will help to lower home insurance bills for millions of families, especially in rural areas and condo buildings. The changes fix expensive, stupid Biden-era requirements with simple, common-sense updates that respond to today’s skyrocketing insurance prices.
Real estate closings look, from the outside, like a documentation and logistics exercise. Paperwork is compiled, funds are moved, signatures are gathered, and the deed changes hands. That’s the visible part of the job, but it’s genuinely not the most important part. ALTA member Jay Roberts writes that what most buyers, sellers and even lending partners never see is the parallel process running underneath every transaction: a trained, systematic effort to detect fraud before it can do damage.
Top banks in the mortgage space, which have relied on a similar playbook for years, say they could become more active if upcoming changes to capital rules provide more flexibility, several industry executives told HousingWire. But any shift in strategy is expected to take time.
illions of acres of farmland across the country are privately owned, but a small share of it is foreign-owned land sitting idle in many areas. That's according to new U.S. Department of Agriculture data which shows just how much of the nation's agricultural land is owned by other countries.
A federal lawsuit accuses Wells Fargo, Rocket Mortgage, and Mr. Cooper of pursuing a foreclosure built on disputed payment records and an unverified heir claim. Demia Shymansky filed the action on March 18, 2026, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, naming thirteen defendants. No defendant has yet responded, and no court has made any findings on the merits.
The housing market is quickly approaching the spring buying season, with the best time to sell in 2026 less than a month away. The week of April 12-18 is expected to be the ideal time to list a home this year, as typical market seasonality and improving affordability conditions at this point in the spring typically create an opportunistic window for sellers, according to a new Realtor.com report.
For the housing market, the winter of 2025–26 could be called the Year of the Turtle. It took longer to sell a house, but the deal eventually got to the finish line. Oh yeah. February’s buyers also nailed a better deal than in any February in three years. According to the latest tabulation from the Redfin real estate brokerage, it took a whopping 66 days — more than nine weeks of showings, keeping the place tidy and locking the dog away — for a house to find a buyer in February.
Wire fraud in real estate is no longer the work of opportunistic scammers. It has evolved into a sophisticated, global enterprise. One that is faster, smarter and often better organized than many in the industry understand. That was the stark message delivered to more than 400 attendees during the ALTA EDge session, “The Great Transaction Heist: Inside Modern Wire Fraud,” experts pulled back the curtain on how modern fraud operations really work.
President Donald Trump on Friday signed a pair of executive orders aimed at showing his commitment to improving home affordability — a key issue for many voters going into November's election for control of the House and Senate. ALTA supports the administration’s commitment to improving housing affordability and expanding opportunities for homeownership. The association also appreciates the President’s focus on expanding access to digital closings, electronic mortgages and other process efficiencies that improve the homebuying experience for American families—innovations that ALTA and the title industry have long championed. Click here to read ALTA's full statement regarding the executive orders.
Pending home sales rose in February as mortgage rates hit a three-year low, before the Iran war caused an oil shock that sent mortgage rates sharply higher. Contract signings were up 1.8% last month compared to January but declined 0.8% from a year earlier, the National Association of Realtors reported Tuesday.
Fannie Mae dropped its March Housing Forecast this week. Fannie Mae’s March predictions for mortgage rates were more optimistic than in its February Housing Forecast, but its expectations for new construction on single-family housing worsened for most of 2026.
A bill passed by the Senate last week seeks to ban institutional investors such as Blackstone or Invitation Homes from buying up single-family homes to rent out. The bill left a loophole that some housing experts and lobbyists say could make the prohibition almost meaningless.
Builder confidence ticked higher in March, but the new-home market remained a story of stubborn affordability pressures and heavy discounting rather than a clear turn in sentiment.
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