Production Drives Impac Layoffs

The real estate investment trust recently laid off 108 employees, company spokeswoman Tania Jernigan told MortgageDaily.com in a telephone interview Wednesday. Eighty-nine of the affected workers were employed in California and the other 19 outside the state, including in Illinois and Denver, Colo.

The decision to eliminate jobs was “based on the overall market decline and our own production,” Jernigan said. “We had to adjust accordingly to be profitable and compete.”

Prior to the job cuts, which occurred in the first week of May, Impac had 872 full-time employees, according to the spokeswoman. Workers affected by the reductions received severance packages.

On May 10, the Irvine, Calif.-based lender released its first quarter results, showing $2.2 billion in acquisitions and originations of primarily Alt-A mortgages — almost halfway below the $4.1 billion volume in the linked quarter.

The real estate investment trust additionally suffered a net loss of $121.7 million — deepening from the fourth quarter’s net loss of $50.6 billion — due to factors such as decreased gain on sale of loans and an increase in the provision for repurchases.

“We have continued to price our loans for profitability which has resulted in reduced production volumes from the fourth quarter of 2006,” Impac Chairman and Chief Executive Joe Tomkinson said in the written statement. “In addition, we are reviewing other strategies to protect our adjusted net interest margin, reduce production costs and selectively maintain our mortgage operations infrastructure in preparation for a more favorable market.”