Dive Brief:
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Fewer mortgage lenders are making it harder for potential homeowners to qualify for loans, but the demand for those loans is weak, Fannie Mae said Wednesday in its fourth-quarter 2014 Mortgage Lender Sentiment Survey.
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In the first quarter, 28% of lenders in the survey said they were making their credit standards tighter, compared with 13% this time.
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The easier loan process doesn’t have mortgage applicants lining up at bank doors, however. The number of would-be homeowners applying for loans dropped slightly between the third and fourth quarters, and more lenders in this survey than in the third quarter said they expect demand to continue to fall over the next three months.
Dive Insight:
The senior mortgage executives in the survey are more pessimistic than the general public is about consumers’ ability to qualify for mortgages, the survey revealed. Still, those same bankers are more optimistic about the overall economy, and said they expect the housing market to “continue to grind its way upward next year.”