After five-straight quarter-over-quarter gains, home-loan production slowed at Bank of America Corp. The mortgage servicing portfolio was also down.
Quarterly residential loan closings came to $16.851 billion, according to BofA’s third-quarter earnings data.
Business slowed from the
prior period, when originations were at $19.171 billion. Mortgage production had increased on a quarter-over-quarter basis each quarter since last year’s slow first-quarter — peaking in the second-quarter 2015.
Still, the most-recent recent total was better than the $14.950 billion closed in the third-quarter 2014.
Altogether, BofA funded $52.953 billion in home loans from Jan. 1 to Sept. 30 of this year.
The majority of the decline in total production occurred in the first-mortgage category, with just $13.711 billion funded compared to $15.962 billion in the three-months ended June 30. Quarterly originations of home-equity loans slipped to $3.140 billion from $3.209 billion.
As of Sept. 30, the financial firm’s mortgage servicing portfolio — which included residential loans, HELs and home-equity lines of credit — was at $580 billion. The servicing portfolio was down from the June 30-endcap of $610 billion and the Sept. 30, 2014, amount of $722 billion.
BofA serviced $391 billion home loans for investors. This part of the servicing portfolio shrank from $409 billion at the end of June and $491 billion as of Sept. 30, 2014.
Residential assets on the company’s balance sheet dropped to $265.969 billion from the June-end total of $279.831 billion. The mortgage investment portfolio also was smaller than the $312.236 billion marking last year’s September-end balance.
The most-recent mortgage asset total reflected $187.939 billion in mortgages and $78.030 billion in HELs.
The lender’s commercial real estate assets expanded to $55.629 billion from $52.344 billion on the balance sheet as of June 30 and $47.023 billion as of the same point last year.
Inching ahead from the second-quarter’s $2.720 billion income before income taxes and the third-quarter 2014’s $2.619 billion — the consumer banking division pulled in $2.750 billion during the latest three-month period.
Company-wide, BofA’s quarterly income before taxes fell $1.5 billion from the second-quarter 2015 to $6.1 billion. The latest earnings were much improved, however, over the $0.4 billion brought in during the same quarter last year.
In the legacy assets and servicing division, staff ranks shrank by 1,400 from three months earlier to 12,300 as of the end of last month. Staffing subsided by 6,200 workers in this sector from the end of the third quarter last year.
Headcount across the entire company came to 215,193 full-time equivalent employees or 1,486 fewer than listed at the end of the second quarter. Staffing was also lower than 229,538 workers as of Sept. 30, 2014.
With 4,741 U.S. financial centers accounted for at the end of last month, the Charlotte, North Carolina-based organization’s brick-and-mortar decreased by 48 locations, according to inventory accounted for on June 30.
