It’s widely known that Wells Fargo and Financial Freedom are, by a wide margin, the two largest reverse mortgage lenders in the country. But who are the fastest growing reverse mortgage lenders?

To answer this question, we looked at at HECM activity reports for the 26-month period from January 2005 through February 2007 to determine the average monthly number of loans for each lender and the percent growth in the monthly average between 2005 and 2006 and between 2006 and the first two months of 2007.

We looked at established lenders who had averaged 25 or more HECM loans per month since January 2005. We then further categorized them into two groups: 1) lenders averaging 50 or more HECMs per months and, 2) those averaging 25-49 HECMs per month. Space did not allow a listing of smaller volume lenders. However, in the next post we’ll look at fast-rising lenders who have more recently gotten into the reverse mortgage market.

The following table ranks the two groups of lenders in descending order of their percent change in average monthly loan volume between 2005 and 2006:

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	HECM Loans Jan05- Feb07	26-Mo. Average	Mo. Avg. 2005	Mo. Avg. 2006	Mo. Avg. 2007	% Chg 2006 vs 2005	% Chg 2007 vs 2006
Lenders Averaging 50 or More HECM Loans per Month Since January 2005:
AMERICAN REVERSE MORTGAGE CORP	2,490	96	49	127	187	157.0%	46.9%
ACADEMY MORTGAGE LLC	1,611	62	35	80	113	129.2%	39.9%
LIBERTY REVERSE MORTGAGE INC	3,957	152	102	185	259	80.6%	40.1%
WELLS FARGO BANK NA	44,515	1,712	1,281	2,116	1,876	65.2%	-11.4%
LIBERTYSTREET FINANCIAL GROUP	1,355	52	41	65	43	60.8%	-34.9%
FINANCIAL FREEDOM SENIOR FUNDI	15,498	596	428	686	1,066	60.4%	55.3%
SEATTLE MORTGAGE COMPANY	5,855	225	172	265	306	54.1%	15.5%
BNY MORTGAGE COMPANY LLC	3,203	123	107	145	88	35.0%	-39.3%
PACIFIC REVERSE MORTGAGE INC	1,827	70	72	70	59	-2.2%	-16.2%
U.S. FINANCIAL MORTGAGE CORPOR	1,438	55	83	33	24	-60.4%	-26.9%
Lenders Averaging 25-49 HECM Loans per Month Since January 2005:
OMNI HOME FINANCING INC	779	30	1	50	84	8542.9%	65.6%
NEW HORIZONS REVERSE MORTGAGE	821	32	5	53	66	1052.7%	24.9%
SEMINOLE FUNDING INC	670	26	6	38	73	539.4%	91.6%
HOME CENTER MORTGAGE	1,268	49	14	77	84	436.4%	8.0%
VERTICAL LEND INC	1,137	44	11	58	151	414.7%	158.0%
FIRST MARINER BANK	1,240	48	22	67	85	207.2%	25.5%
AMERICAN MORTGAGE PROFESSIONAL	842	32	19	45	41	139.3%	-8.2%
URBAN FINANCIAL GROUP	1,027	40	23	46	100	97.8%	117.1%
SUN AMERICAN MORTGAGE CO	707	27	19	34	34	81.5%	-1.0%
REVERSE MORTGAGES OF CA IN	908	35	24	44	44	79.9%	0.2%
CARTERET MORTGAGE CORPORATION	753	29	21	34	46	64.4%	34.3%
CIRCLE MORTGAGE CORPORATION	1,096	42	33	52	38	59.5%	-27.3%
WWMF INC	650	25	20	30	27	54.0%	-12.2%
M AND T MORTGAGE CORPORATION	745	29	26	36	0	38.0%	-100.0%
WEBSTER BANK	668	26	21	29	35	34.5%	22.4%
SENIOR FUNDING ASSOCIATES	791	30	27	36	20	30.7%	-45.1%
MERIT FINANCIAL INC	724	28	27	33	4	24.8%	-89.4%
GRIFFIN FINANCIAL MORTGAGE LLC	1,186	46	41	50	46	23.3%	-8.6%
AMSTON MORTGAGE	1,177	45	40	44	86	8.7%	95.8%
SENIORS FIRST MORTGAGE COMPANY	794	31	28	28	62	-2.6%	123.0%
CALIFORNIA REVERSE MORTGAGE CO	818	31	36	33	0	-8.4%	-100.0%

Social tagging: Reverse Mortgage Lenders

A Few More Related Articles of Interest:

Fast Rising Reverse Mortgage Lenders

HMBS - HECM Mortgaged Backed Securities

Death of the HECM 100?

TALC - Total Annual Loan Cost

Credit Unions Slow to Embrace Reverse Mortgages