While residential lending grew at SunTrust Banks Inc., the loan servicing portfolio shrank. Still, mortgage earnings climbed over the prior period.
First-quarter earnings data revealed SunTrust originated $5.109 billion in new loans during the period.
Correspondent acquisitions accounted for 53 percent of the production total, while the remaining 47 percent came from retail originators.
Home loan fundings increased $0.385 billion over fourth-quarter 2014 production.
As well, loan activity was better than first-quarter 2014 originations at $3.106 billion.
Refinance share was beefed up to 60 percent from 44 percent in the prior quarter.
Second-quarter originations will likely continue their forward momentum based on first-quarter applications of $9.8 billion. The current figure expanded from the $6.6 billion provided for the prior three-month period.
As of March 31, SunTrust’s total loan servicing portfolio was $141.760 billion, which included $115.579 billion in loans serviced for third-parties.
The total servicing portfolio thinned from $142.116 billion as of Dec. 31, 2014, but widened from $135.180 billion as of March 31, 2014.
The lender’s investment portfolio dipped to $38.028 billion from $38.339 billion three months prior and $42.263 billion at the same point in the previous year.
At the end of March 2015, residential assets included $0.655 billion in government-guaranteed loans, $23.419 billion in non-guaranteed loans and $13.954 billion in home-equity loans.
Delinquency of between 30 and 89 days on non-guaranteed mortgage investment loans improved to 0.40 percent from the previous three-month period, when delinquency was 6 basis points higher. Loan delinquency in this category also improved over the 0.50 percent calculated as of March 31 last year.
For HELs, the 0.60 percent loan delinquency was better than December 2014-ended and March 2014-ended percentages, with delinquency retreating 11 BPS and 13 BPS, respectively.
Residential construction assets ended March 2015 at
$0.417 billion.
The Atlanta-based entity’s balance sheet also showed $7.873 billion in commercial real estate assets, which consisted of $6.389 billion in commercial mortgages and $1.484 billion in construction loans.
The CRE loan portfolio was behind the $7.952 billion accounted for in last year’s final quarter but was ahead of the $6.881 billion tallied at the end of last year’s first quarter.
Delinquency on commercial mortgages was 0.05 percent, the same figure reported three months earlier and improved from 0.11 percent seen in 2014 at the end of March.
Altogether, SunTrust’s mortgage business earned $126 million, a $12 million increase over the prior quarter and a $29 million gain over the same quarter last year.
The latest quarterly mortgage earnings included $83 million from production and $43 million from servicing.
On a company-wide basis, the corporation bumped earnings up to $622 million before income taxes. SunTrust’s pulled in $100 million more than it did in the quarter ended Dec. 31, 2014, and earnings for the quarter ended March 31, 2014, were at a revised $522 million.
When the first earnings period ended, SunTrust accounted for 24,466 full-time equivalent employees. Headcount was down from the 24,638 reported as of the end of last year and the 25,925 inventoried as of the same point 2014.
Full-service banking offices were reduced to 1,444 — down by one as of Dec. 31 last year.
