The Conference of State Bank Supervisors (CSBS) recently released data from the first and second quarters regarding state-licensed mortgage companies, branches, and individuals in the Nationwide Mortgage Licensing System & Registry (NMLS), which showed positive growth in the mortgage industry at a state level.
Although there are multi-state companies that operate on a regional and nationwide level, first and second quarter data from this year revealed that most state-licensed mortgage entities are local, small business-oriented companies, says CSBS.
For example, approximately 83% of companies licensed through NMLS only operate in one state, and have small staffs, with between one and five mortgage loan originators, CSBS data showed. Of these companies, 87% have just one location.
On a similar note, 80% of state-licensed individuals operate in a single state.
“Thanks to NMLS, state regulators have access, for the first time, to comprehensive data that provide a better understanding of the industry from a nationwide and state-by-state vantage point,” said Gavin Gee, Idaho Director of Finance and Chairman of the State Regulatory Registry LLC, the subsidiary of CSBS that operates NMLS on behalf of state regulators. “Access to this data provides the industry, regulators, and policymakers with an unprecedented level of detail about the state-licensed residential mortgage industry.”
Highlights of CSBS’s data for 2011’s first and second quarters include positive growth for the mortgage industry at a state level, which remains localized. It found that business activities for state-licensed companies is primarily broker-related, as 89% conduct first mortgage loan brokering activities, while only 22% conduct first mortgage lending activities.
The numbers of state-licensed mortgage companies went up from the first to the second quarter, from just under 15,000, to more than 16,000, and licenses in NMLS also increased to more than 30,000, up from 28,415. The number of state-licensed mortgage loan originators also increased, and more than 48,500 individual mortgage loan originator applications were approved in the first half of the year.
The NMLS first and second quarter data for 2011 can be viewed here.
Written by Alyssa Gerace
