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MOVERS & SHAKERS CONTINUED FROM PAGE 34 Pro Teck Gains Experienced Sales Professional Pro Teck Valuation Services recently announced that Duane Hale joined the company as SVP of national sales. Before transitioning to real estate valuations, Hale was both a loan officer and credit manager. Prior to joining Pro Teck, he was most recently SVP of business development for Lender Processing Services. Wingspan Appoints 30-Year Veteran to Newly Created Post Wingspan Portfolio Advisors named industry veteran Susan Pettem to the newly created position of business development EVP. Pettem has spent more than 30 years in the mortgage business. Prior to joining Wingspan, she was SVP and national accounts executive for First American Mortgage Services. She also worked for Fidelity National Financial and Lender Processing Services. Marketing Compliance Expert Joins Lenders Compliance Group Lenders Compliance Group, Inc., appointed Michael J. Wallace, Esq., to the position of director of marketing compliance. Wallace has spent more than 20 years counseling clients on federal and state industry laws and regulations regarding mortgage acts, practices, and marketing. He is also the developer of Clix MG Inc., a contact management provider for the mortgage industry. Claims Recovery Financial Services Appoints President and Chief Strategist Claims Recovery Financial Services, LLC, named Cecelia M. Raine company president and chief strategist. Prior to joining CRFS, Raine was SVP of strategy and business development for Lender Processing Services, Inc. She has more than 28 years' mortgage banking experience, 11 of which were spent overseeing servicing and default processes for Fannie Mae. Potestivo & Associates Promotes Title Coordinator to Attorney Team Potestivo & Associates, P.C., announced the hiring of Nathan Lichtman as an associate attorney. Lichtman is located in the firm's Rochester Hills office where he assists with the firm's Illinois operations. Lichtman was employed as a title coordinator/law clerk at the Rochester Hills office since March 2013. Platinum Data Recruits Valuations Expert to Tap Growing Market Valuations expert Craig Zielazny joined Platinum Data Solutions as SVP of valuation analytics to build out its automated valuation model offerings. Zielazny has more than 13 years' experience in the business, including tenures with AV Metrics, Equifax, and Huntington National Bank. He led the growth of two different analytics products from $100,000 to $1 million in less than a year. Hubzu Welcomes New President The online real estate marketplace Hubzu has a new leader on board. The company named Eric M. Koenig president. Koenig has experience driving growth initiatives for technology brands, having served as COO and SVP of global business operations at Expedia and as SVP and head of corporate development and strategy at AON. CONTINUED ON PAGE 38 VALUE OF NATION'S HOUSING STOCK UP $1.9T IN 2013 Based on early estimates of home values, properties nationwide are expected to have gained almost $1.9 trillion in value in 2013, according to Zillow. Analysts for the real estate marketplace predict housing in the United States reached a cumulative value of $25.7 trillion at year-end, up 7.9 percent from the end of 2012. If their predictions ring true, it will be the second straight annual gain in total home values and the largest increase since 2005, Zillow says. Out of the 485 total metro areas analyzed by Zillow, about 90 percent experienced home value gains in 2013. 36 "In 2013, the housing market continued to build on the positive momentum that began in 2012, after the housing market bottomed. Low mortgage rates and an improving economy helped bring buyers into the market, boosting demand and driving prices up," said Dr. Stan Humphries, Zillow's chief economist. Humphries expects these gains to continue into 2014, though at a slower pace. What's more, Zillow researchers believe the value of the nation's housing stock has recovered about $2.8 trillion, or 44 percent, of the value it lost from 2007 through 2011. Long Liquidation Times Ramp Up Loss Severities While home prices have risen 14 percent nationally since their trough a few years ago, Fitch Ratings points out in a recent report that loss severities on residential mortgagebacked securities (RMBS) have improved only "modestly." Loss severities improved just 5 percent over the 12 months ending in September, according to Fitch. The primary reason for the slow improvement, the ratings agency concluded, is prolonged liquidation timelines, which "reached an alltime high in third-quarter 2013 and increased at a faster rate in 2013 than in any prior year." In fact, 32 percent of seriously delinquent homeowners have not made a payment on their mortgage in more than four years, Fitch says. That's up drastically from 7 percent at the start of 2012, according to the ratings agency. About 40 percent of the mortgages that have been seriously delinquent for the past four years are legacy Countrywide loans now serviced by Bank of America, Fitch says. The average liquidation timeline was 32 months as of the third quarter of 2013, the ratings agency's study showed. Fitch says this is twice as long as the 2008 average. Several events have led to increasing liquidation timelines over the past few years. Two major contributors cited by Fitch are the introduction of the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP) and the investigation and national foreclosure lawsuit that led many servicers to halt their foreclosure processes in 2009 and 2010. Amid this environment, the rate of seriously delinquent loans transitioning into foreclosure reached an all-time low, according to Fitch's records. Meanwhile, loan modification rates approached an all-time high. While timelines are raising loss severities, short sales, which have risen from 20 percent of liquidations in 2009 to 60 percent in 2013, are lowering loss severities. In fact, short sales on homes with subprime loans incur loss severities about 20 percent lower than REO sales, according to Fitch.

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