Mortgage servicer Ocwen Financial Corp. (NYSE:OCN) announced in an 8-K filing last Thursday its plans to buy Pasadena, Calif.-based OneWest Bank’s mortgage servicing rights for $2.5 billion.
Ocwen, based in Atlanta, Ga., plans to buy $78 billion in unpaid principal balances of mortgage servicing rights using a combination of cash and available credit in a deal expected to close during the second half of 2013.
OneWest has assets of about $25 billion and was founded in 2009, the same year it acquired the failed Independent National Mortgage Corporation (IndyMac Bank). IndyMac had acquired Financial Freedom, a reverse mortgage originator and server, in July 2004. When OneWest acquired IndyMac, it also acquired Financial Freedom, which it later shut down in 2011 after OneWest exited the wholesale reverse mortgage origination business.
The servicing rights acquisition represents the latest in a series of similar portfolio additions by Ocwen, including the purchase of Liberty Home Equity Solutions from Genworth Financial (NYSE:GNW) for $22 million in a sea that closed in April.
Written by Alyssa Gerace
