DS News

» VISIT US ONLINE @ DSNEWS.COM 93 the existing holding company, LenderLive Holdings, Inc. e company also announced that: » Rod Walz, President and Founder of WALZ, is now Vice Chairman of LenderLive Holdings. In this new role, he will be a strategic advisor to CEO Rick Seehausen and the executive team, as well as to the newly combined LenderLive Document Services. » Dave Vida, President of Mortgage Ser- vices, now serves as President of Lender- Live Network. » Pete Pannes, the company's Chief Rev- enue Officer, has been named President of the new LenderLive Services, LLC. » Joe Mowery, General Manager of Settle- ment Services, now reports to Pannes. » Jonathan Kunkle, General Manager of LenderLive Document Services now reports to Pannes. » Maria Moskver, who was General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer of WALZ, is now the company's General Counsel and Enterprise Compliance Of- ficer for LenderLive Holdings. "Basically, our businesses fall into one of two categories: regulated, as is the case with our mortgage services, and unregulated com- ponent services, such as our title, origination and servicing documents offerings," Seehausen said. "Our new structure will make it easier for us to work with our regulators, accelerate the expansion of our title operations, and allow us to take advantage of synergies among our document and settlement services businesses. While a number of our executives have new leadership roles, they have all been instrumen- tal in building LenderLive and are the right team to take us to the next level." WASHINGTON Short Supply Causing Faster Price Appreciation Fewer homes for sale over the past year have driven prices up faster than expected, according Zillow's latest Real Estate Market Report. According to the report, while the number of houses for sale nationwide dropped by 3.4 percent over the past year, housing prices rose almost 5 percent. Last year, Zillow predicted a 2 percent growth by this April. Unsurprisingly, buyers looking for higher- end homes will have more options, and those looking to buy less expensive or entry-level homes will find an increasingly limited supply and rising prices. e number of entry-level homes for sale is down almost 8 percent over the past 12 months, and this coupled with still-low mortgage rates and increasing wages nationwide are creating stiff competition for homes, the report states. e report also found that 16 percent of top-tier homes had a price cut over the past year, compared to 11 percent of bottom-tier homes and 13 percent of middle-tier. e most exaggerated example of the low inventory/higher prices dynamic was in Port- land, where the number of homes for sale over the past two years has dropped almost 40 per- cent and the value of those sold has risen by 15 percent over the past 12 months. Zillow found similar trends in Dallas, Seattle, and Denver, where inventory is down more than 20 percent and home value growth is in the double-digits. Some markets showed a less exaggerated picture. Indianapolis posted an 18 percent drop in total homes available but only a 2 percent rise in prices over the past year, while Kansas City sold 22.5 percent fewer houses, but saw prices rise by 5.5 percent. Some markets posted a rise in homes available over the past month, but there is no pattern. Highly sought-after markets like San Diego and Austin rose, as did long-troubled metros like Baltimore and Pittsburgh, but all metros with more homes to sell also posted rises in home prices. Miami-Fort Lauderdale saw the biggest inventory rise, at 18 percent. Home values there rose a little more than 10 percent. "e struggle will continue for home shop- pers this summer," said Zillow Chief Econo- mist Svenja Gudell. "New construction has been sluggish over the past year; we're building about half as many homes as we should be in a normal market." Gudell added that there still aren't enough homes on the market to keep up with the high demand from every type of home buyer. "is summer's selling season's borders will most likely be blurred again as many buyers are left without homes and will need to keep search- ing," she said. THE LEADER IN DEFAULT SERVICING NEWS Help shape the next issue of DS News. Drop us a line at Editor@DSNews.com. Washington's serious delinquency rate (2.1 percent) and foreclosure inventory rate (0.8 percent) in April were below the national averages for the month of 3.0 percent and 1.1 percent, according to CoreLogic. KNOW THIS

• Cover