Multifamily business at the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. fell last year, though a surge was reported in the second half.
Volume last’s year for Freddie Mac’s multifamily whole loan and bond guarantee business came in at $15 billion, a news release said.
Activity drifted down from $17 billion the year before.
Although annual activity retreated, business picked up in the second half of 2010, according to Freddie Executive Vice President of Multifamily Mike May.
“It was like a switch was flipped on in the third and fourth quarters and market volume surged,” May stated in the announcement. “We funded approximately 50 percent of our annual volume in the fourth quarter.”
May speculated that property owners who had been sitting on the sidelines started buying and selling properties partly due to market optimism, low interest rates and yearend objectives.
Of last year’s business, 69 percent was refinance.
The McLean, Va.-based secondary lender said its multifamily market share was 30 percent during 2010.
Delinquency on Dec. 31 was 31 basis points, worse than 19Â BPS previously reported for a year earlier.
