Mortgage fundings moved higher, home-loan delinquency declined and earnings improved at SunTrust Banks Inc.
Residential loan production climbed to $8.0 billion in the third quarter from the prior period’s $7.0 billion, according to earnings data released Thursday. Originations were $11.6 billion during the same quarter last year.
Year-to-date Sept. 30, SunTrust funded $20.6 billion.
Third-quarter activity included $4.0 billion in retail fundings, better than $3.8 billion in the second quarter. Correspondent business rose to $2.1 billion from $1.6 billion, and the mortgage broker channel generated $1.9 billion, up from $1.6 billion.
Refinance share jumped to two-thirds from 46 percent.
The servicing portfolio slipped to $176.6 billion on Sept. 30 from $177.8 billion on June 30. The third-party portion of the portfolio was $143.6 billion.
Residential mortgage holdings climbed to $32.0 billion from $31.1 billion. Last year at this time, home loan assets were $31.6 billion.
Home-equity line-of-credit holdings at the Atlanta-based bank declined to $15.3 billion from $15.4 billion at the end of the second quarter. HELOC assets were $16.1 billion in the third quarter last year.
Construction assets fell to $4.4 billion from $5.0 billion on June 30 and $7.4 billion a year earlier.
Overall residential delinquency of at least two months fell to 1.51 percent from 1.58 percent on June 30. The Sept. 30 figure reflected mortgage delinquency of 1.40 percent, a HELOCÂ rate of 0.69 percent and a second-mortgage rate of 2.31 percent.
Moody’s Investors Service said Thursday that it placed SunTrust Mortgage Inc.’s SQ2+ primary residential servicer rating on review for a possible downgrade as a result of “irregularities in SunTrust’s foreclosure process, specifically, that notaries may not have been present during the signing of some affidavits.” Several other major residential servicers have recently faced similar actions.
Commercial mortgages owned finished the third quarter at $14.8 billion. Loans secured by commercial real estate were $15.1 billion on June 30 and $15.3 billion on Sept. 30, 2009.
Commercial real estate delinquency of between 30 and 89 days fell to 0.62 percent from 0.81 percent.
SunTrust had an estimated $95 million in repurchase losses that were recognized, better than $148 million three months earlier. Repurchase reserves climbed to $270 million from $256 million and were just $123 million at the same point last year.
Mortgage banking earnings were a $170 million loss, though that was better than the $416 million loss a year earlier. Mortgage production income swung to a $133 million profit from a $16 million second-quarter loss. Mortgage servicing income was $132 million, better than around $88 million in the second quarter.
SunTrust Banks Inc. earned $153 million in the third quarter, rising from $12 million three months earlier. The corporation had a $317 million loss a year earlier.
The entire organization finished September with 28,599 full-time employees, a few more than 28,250 at the end of June.
