Impac Mortgage Holdings Inc. expanded its wholesale sales staff and acquired a retail origination business — helping it to more than double quarterly loan production.
The Irvine, California-based company reported in its first-quarter earnings data that mortgage originations were $2.285 billion in the three months ended March 31.
Business more than doubled from the prior period, when production totaled $1.109 billion.
Impac funded just $0.353 billion during the first-quarter 2014.
First-quarter 2015 production included $1.408 billion in retail business, exploding from only $0.025 billion three months earlier. The growth reflected Impac’s taking over of CashCall Mortgage’s retail call center on Jan. 2. The acquisition actually closed on March 31.
Wholesale lending activity shot up 77 percent from the fourth quarter to $0.282 billion. Impac explained that it added wholesale salespeople during the quarter.
“We expect this volume will continue for at least the near term as we expect to gain market share from the expansion of our sales coverage,” the report said. “In addition, the percentage of our wholesale customers delivering multiple loans per month continues to increase month over month.”
Correspondent acquisitions, however, declined 36 percent to $0.596 billion. The drop reflects the loss of CashCall as a correspondent client — though the increase in retail activity more than made up for the loss.
The lender serviced $2.577 billion as of the end of last month, up from $2.267 billion at the end of last year. The servicing portfolio was $2.240 billion as of the same date last year.
The growth in the portfolio came despite the sale of mortgage servicing rights on $1.6 billion in loans. The MSR sales are being made to help manage liquidity.
Impac earned $10 million prior to income taxes, swinging from a $2 million fourth-quarter loss and a $3 million first-quarter 2014 loss.
Behind the improved income was primarily increased gain on sale of loans as a result of the higher originations.
