Beside energy shocks, the hurricanes could remove as many as half a million jobs. In terms of incomes or output, the losses could be as high as one-half a trillion dollars, which would slow the economy to a growth rate of less than 2 percent for at least one quarter, The Conference Board said.

Faced with higher energy prices, higher interest rates and slower job growth over the next few months, consumers' willingness and ability to spend could be challenged. If consumers curb their spending, it could spell major trouble for retailers in the rapidly approaching\holiday season.

"From an energy standpoint, the storms could not have come at a worse time for U.S. consumers and businesses," said Ken Goldstein, senior economist of The Conference Board. "While Katrina wasn't necessarily a bigger storm than Hurricane Andrew that crippled southern Florida in 1992, it disrupted energy supplies at a time when the balance between supply and demand was already precarious. Hurricane Rita's impact was less than Katrina's because it largely spared the chemical and proto-chemical facilities in the region."

However, energy prices could fall back in the near future and government and private sector spending on reconstruction is already adding jobs in the areas directly affected by the hurricanes. Oil prices will likely stay in the range of $60-$65 per barrel for the rest of 2005, and then ease to about $55 during the first half of 2006.

The impact of higher energy prices did not show up in the September consumer price report, according to Orawin Velz, director of economic forecasting, Mortgage Bankers Association’s economics and research department. “The core consumer price index increased by 0.1 percent for a fifth consecutive month. From a year ago, core prices increased by just 2.0 percent, down from 2.1 percent in August,” Velz said.

“While Katrina eroded consumer sentiment and caused large declines in industrial production, its negative impact on consumer spending was modest in September, as retail sales outside of autos continued to be healthy,” Velz said.

In 2006, the economy should recover and resume a growth path closer to its long-term average rate of about 3.5 percent, The Conference Board said. The overall growth rate for the year will be 2.5 percent. The outlook assumes the Federal Reserve Board will not raise the federal funds rate higher than 4 percent. Should the Fed continue to hike rates and the yield curve invert, the outlook will be significantly worse, the report said.
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Adamson comes to MortgageHub from Blue Ocean Ventures, a venture development company focused on the technology sector. He is a founder of Praxis Technology Group, DocuMesh and Blue Ocean Ventures. He brings 15 years of technology experience; prior to founding these firms, he worked for companies such as 3M, Cargill and Norwest Mortgage and provided technical consulting services to SunTrust, Wells Fargo Home Mortgage and GMAC. 

As chief strategy officer, Patel will have direct responsibility for the development and implementation of corporate strategy. He remains an ongoing member of the company's Executive Committee.

United General Title Insurance Co., Denver, a subsidiary of First American Title Insurance Co., appointed Steven Winkler as senior vice president and corporate underwriting counsel, supporting the company’s underwriting efforts nationwide.
 
Winkler has 33 years of industry experience. Prior to joining United General, he served as senior vice president and counsel for First American Title Insurance Co.

Rapid Reporting, Ft. Worth, Texas, announced the appointment Todd Hedspeth as senior vice president of risk mitigation, responsible for expanding the company’s fraud prevention products and services.

Hedspeth brings nearly two decades of banking and mortgage lending experience, focused primarily in fraud prevention and risk mitigation to his position. Most recently Hedspeth was the regional quality control manager at Homecomings Financial, a provider of wholesale funding services to mortgage brokers.

National City Mortgage, Miamisburg, Ohio, named John Bollman executive vice president and manager of the company’s retail production division. He will lead the division of more than 400 retail locations and 4,000 employees.  Bollman replaces Buck Bibb, who was named CEO of the company.

Bollman joined National City in 1996, as a result of the Integra Mortgage acquisition, where he was senior vice president of secondary marketing.  Since then, he held positions as vice president-retail mortgage product manager, senior vice president-production operations, and senior vice president-national retail operations. Since 2004, Bollman was executive vice president of the NCM Advantage, a major loan origination initiative.

Sperry Van Ness, Irvine, Calif., appointed Robert Shannon as senior advisor for the company’s Northeast regional office, based in Boston.

Shannon has 29 years of commercial real estate experience, specializing in the sale of retail properties, single tenant net leased properties and 1031 tax deferred exchanges. Prior to joining Sperry Van Ness, he owned The Shannon Co., a real estate appraisal, consulting and brokerage firm, which he started in 1987.  Previously, he served as manager of the real estate appraisal services department for the Boston office of Laventhol & Horwath.

The Treasury Department announced the appointments of David Nason as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions Policy and Kevin MacMillan as Legislative Affairs Deputy Assistant Secretary for Banking and Finance.

Nason comes from the Securities & Exchange Commission, where he served as counsel on capital raising and corporate governance issues, Gramm-Leach-Bliley compliance and hedge fund and mutual fund initiatives.  Prior to joining the SEC, Nason was an attorney at Covington & Burling in Washington, D.C.

MacMillan recently served as senior counsel to the House Financial Services Committee, where he drafted legislation, organized legislative and investigative hearings and performed policy analysis and interpretation on issues including government sponsored enterprises, banking, payment systems and international trade and monetary policy.

First Magnus Financial Corp., Tucson, Ariz., appointed Kevin Peranio as manager of the company’s Florida wholesale branch in Fort Lauderdale.

Peranio has worked with First Magnus for nearly five years. He helped build the Houston market for First Magnus as an account executive, then went to the company’s Tampa office to help train the new sales staff.

EBI Consulting, Burlington, Mass., announced four promotions within the company's Real Estate Group:

Keith Spolan, who has been with EBI Consulting since 2001, was promoted to real estate operations manager for the Southeast Region. Prior to this promotion, Spolan was a client manager.

Doug Meade, also of EBI Consulting's Southeast Region, and Harlan Miller of EBI Consulting's Mid-Atlantic Region, have both been promoted to the position of senior engineer.  Prior to their promotions, both held the title of project engineer. 

Doug Brinkman of EBI Consulting's Mid-Atlantic Region has been promoted to program manager.  Prior to his promotion, Brinkman was a senior engineer.
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The change for HUD is effective immediately and the Department instructed its Homeownership Centers and revised its Reference Guide to reflect the change. The VA made the change on its Administration Circular 26-05-04. The circular is placed on the VA Loan Guaranty website, and a notice was placed on the Veterans Information Portal.

To view the Homeownership Center (HOC) Reference Guide, visit:  http://www.hud.gov/offices/hsg/sfh/ref/chap2.cfm. 

To view the VA Circular, visit:  http://www.mersinc.org/filedownload.aspx?id=356&table=ProductFile.

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a la mode, Oklahoma City, Okla., announced that its nearly 7,500 agent customers nationwide can obtain podcast information on homes for sale to customers with iPods, portable MP3 players and personal computers through its Propertycast available to all Agent XSite Web site customers.

With Propertycast technology, real estate professionals can record and distribute property descriptions as spoken audio files known as podcasts.

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Interthinx, Calabasas, Calif., integrated its DISSCO (data integrity search and score system) fraud detection and prevention system with easyLENDER mortgage loan origination software (LOS) system. easyLENDER is a product of Fiserv Lending Solutions, Brookfield, Wis. Because of this integration, loans originated in easyLENDER Mortgage can be submitted to DISSCO for automatic screening.
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The Moody’s report, "CMBS: Red -- Yellow -- Green Update, Third Quarter 2005 Quarterly Assessment of U.S. Property Markets," showed New York, Orange County, Calif., Honolulu and Washington, D.C. following Los Angeles as the top U.S. markets. Albuquerque, Tampa, Ventura County, Calif., Miami and Dayton, Ohio all received scores in green, representing the highest category in the report.

Jacksonville, Fla., Hartford, Conn., Trenton, N.J., Atlanta and Las Vegas received the five lowest market scores but all markets scored no lower than yellow. Red signifies the lowest range of scores.

Patricia McDonnell, Moody’s analyst and co-author of the report, said suburban areas tend to be more volatile and softer compared to central business districts (CBDs), as the office supply side poses more risk with fewer restraints on new construction than in built-up downtown areas. The vacancy rate improved to 15.6 percent in the second quarter, from 16.3 percent a quarter earlier, but it is still higher than the 12.5 percent vacancy rate in CBD markets, according to the latest data available, from the second quarter 2005.

The suburban office market, the only property sector not in the green zone, scored a yellow 57, down from 58 in the first quarter while CBD offices remained at 68, just inside the green territory. "Pushing down CBD office vacancy is the dearth of new building, which is broadly based as 26 of the 45 markets covered have zero construction in the pipeline, and an additional seven CBD markets are expected to see their inventories grow by less than one percent," McDonnell said.

Sally Gordon, Moody’s analyst and co-author of the report, said consumer spending propped up community shopping centers as that sector turned in the strongest performance of any CMBS segment with a score of 83 out of a possible 100, a repeat of the previous quarter. “A key measure of shopping center demand, real personal income, is up 1.1 percent, while retail space per capita of 10.3 square feet is at the lowest level of the previous six quarters," Gordon said.

Multifamily housing, also strongly dependent on the consumer side of the economy, remained at 81 from the last quarter. “An impressive 54 of the 59 multifamily markets saw vacancy rates decline year-over-year," McDonnell said.

The industrial sector stayed just inside of green for the fourth consecutive quarter and also maintained a score of 68 for the third straight quarter. Vacancy remains above historical norms at 10.4 percent, but continues to inch downwards from the peak two years ago, the Moody’s analysts said.

Property fundamentals on the CMBS assets remained at an even keel despite a slight dip in hotels. Independent hotel properties were added to full and limited service hotel data as Moody's restated every hotel market score for the first quarter 2005 and incorporated independently-owned hotel data.

Long Island reported the highest share of independent hotel rooms with 69 percent of its total hotel supply, Los Angeles was at 59.5 percent, and San Francisco had 55.9 percent share of independent hotel rooms. Orlando, West Palm Beach, Fla., and Long Island, N.Y. reported the lowest share of independent hotel rooms at 40.7 percent, 35.4 percent and 35.2 percent, respectively.

The full-service sector increased its total supply as of the first quarter by 24.5 percent, based on the inclusion of independent hotels. The restatement increased first quarter full service hotel scores from 66 (yellow) to 73 (green). The current quarter score of 69, green, dropped from the first quarter score.

Independent hotel properties increased the total supply of limited-service hotels by 37.6 percent. The 74 score for limited-service hotels in the second quarter was restated to 80 with independent hotel properties.

"An unprecedented 33 markets experienced year-over-year growth in revenue per available room (RevPAR) in excess of 10 pecent versus only 13 markets last quarter, with 12 markets matching or exceeding their respective RevPAR targets, versus only nine that met their targets last quarter," Gordon said.
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HRECC financed a $77.8 million, three-year loan for the construction of The Macallen Building, an 11-story residential condominium building in Boston. 

The Macallen Building represents Phase II of the Court Square Press Redevelopment, which will contain 143 condominium units, nearly 7,100 square feet of retail space and a three-level, 289-space parking garage.  It will be the first residential building in Boston to qualify for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification by the U.S. Green Building Council and will feature the only living “green roof” in the city, according to the borrower, Macallen Properties LLC, a special purpose entity controlled by local New England real estate developers, the Pappas Family.

Construction will use recycled materials, such as linoleum flooring and quartz stone counters, and will include energy and water saving systems, the Pappas Family said.

Meanwhile, Hypo Real Estate Bank International closed on a $26.5 million mortgage for the acquisition, condominium conversion and sale of Palmetto Plantation, a 256-unit residential property in Mount Pleasant, S.C.  The borrower is Montecito Palmetto Plantation LLC, a subsidiary of the Montecito Property Company.

Palmetto Plantation, located on 33 acres in the affluent and rapidly growing coastal community of Mount Pleasant, consists of 13 buildings and 84 one-bedroom units, 124 two-bedroom units and 48 three-bedroom units. Its amenities include an extensive clubhouse, fitness and pool facilities and playground. “The Mount Pleasant area is well positioned to continue to experience a surge of buyer interest due to its proximity to Island of the Palms and its impressive amenities,” said Evan Denner, deputy CEO of Hypo Real Estate Capital Corp.
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For ACT Mortgage Capital, Sunrise, Fla., this year has seen aggressive expansion; by the middle of next year, ACT should be operational in the entire lower 48 states, from its current 23. The company recently opened a Northeast regional office in Rochelle Park, N.J., and will soon open a new office in Phoenix.

Nelson Haws, ACT Mortgage’s president and CEO, told MBA NewsLink that the company’s growth has been measured and deliberate, aided by technology. In April, ACT launched ACTSys, a Web-based portal for ACT's mortgage broker community. Haws said the project with MindBox, based in Greenbrae, Calif., had been in development since 2003.

"We were looking for a solution that would allow us to speed decisions to our brokers in pricing, product eligibility and loan processing," Haws said. With ACTSys, we have been able to gain more control over our loan eligibility and pricing decisions. We have also been able to create a broker portal that makes it easy and attractive for brokers to do business with us."

ACTSys is built on MindBox's ARTEnterprise product suite, which automates every decision step in the mortgage lending process using rules- and case-based decisioning technology. It allows ACT to provide brokers the ability to receive instant decisions on a variety of loan decisions, including prequalification, pricing, quick quotes, rate locking, credit analysis, product eligibility and best-fit deal structuring.

“We worked very closely with MindBox over the past two years. It’s been the backbone of our growth plan, having a centralized database enabling us to do business and allows us to expand very efficiently, Haws said. “We’ve pretty much put the final touches on the system. For the most part, the system is intact and fully functional. Now we’re in sales expansion. We took two years to get it ironed out here in Sunrise, Fla., and moved forward with the expansion.”

The expansion has been dramatic—in six months ACT has expanded from 15 employees to 250; originations have grown from $25 million per month to nearly $150 per month. But Haws said the technology allows to company’s growth to be measured.

“The technology allows us to efficiently expand,” Haws said. “It allows us to expand without putting a huge investment in human resources. The expansion is not only based on increasing our staff but allows us to control the data.

In addition to creating efficiencies, the system allows ACT Mortgage to effectively manage data and quality control. “We can be in California or Arizona, but brokers see Sunrise as the operations,” Haws said. “The brokers can do everything online; where they are in the country has no real bearing. On the back end, delivering to Wall Street, the date is very easily manipulated in the secondary markets, which allows us to move quickly.”

Such abilities are important from a competitive standpoint, Haws said. “That’s one of our biggest attributes. We compete with GreenPoint and IndyMac, and I feel we’ve created a system that allows us to have an edge in competing with those companies. We’re smaller and we can make decisions faster and more efficiently,” he said. “It’s given us the image of a much larger company, which helps in recruiting staff and brokers; it’s about a 50-50 split.”

And for brokers, the edge is critical. “A broker says, ‘I have to compete.’ We don’t have to create the opportunities for them, but we have to have something that our competitors don’t,” Haws said.

Technology has been ACT Mortgage’s biggest investment, “hands down,” Haws said. “Just because you’re big and capital-happy doesn’t mean you’re efficient. We’ve spent a majority of our money on technology, and it’s a part of our overall vision. We continue to strive towards that. We feel it’s pretty much the way the market is going. And our clients are looking at that.”

By end of this year, Haws said ACT Mortgage would be effectively working in the continental 48 states. “We’ll be expanding our sales force geographically. And we’re also taking the technology to the next level. Hopefully, our partnership with MindBox is very strong we’ve enjoyed our relationship with them. They’ve made some advances and we have suggestions; working together, we can create a system that not only competes with our competitors but also exceeds the needs of our clients.”

Technology is “clearly where the future is going,” Haws said. “We don’t see technology playing any less of a role; we see it playing a much bigger role in the industry, and we hope to define those expectations.”
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