Fitch Affirms Financial Freedom's U.S. RMBS Servicer Rating; Assigns Positive Outlook

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

Fitch Ratings has taken the following actions on the U.S. residential primary servicer rating for Financial Freedom, a division of Onewest Bank, FSB:

--U.S. Residential primary servicer rating for reverse product affirmed at 'RPS3'; Outlook Positive.

The servicer rating actions reflect management changes within several key senior positions and strategic plans to focus on system and operational efficiencies, including several recently completed and in-process enhancements. The rating also incorporates the servicer's proactive adoption of a single point of contact (SPOC) model for its Maturities, Collections and Foreclosure areas. Based on the analysis and the company's profile, Fitch has assigned a Positive Outlook to Financial Freedom's servicer rating.

Although the servicer's customer service metrics, on an annual average, deteriorated slightly compared to the prior year, Financial Freedom implemented measures earlier this year to address this concern. Fitch was provided recent months' metrics which were considerably improved and expects that these efforts will continue; however, Fitch feels that a longer period of time is needed to determine the final impact of these changes.

The rating takes into consideration the financial condition of OneWest Bank FSB (OneWest), a non-rated entity, as financial condition is a component of Fitch's servicer ratings. In addition, the rating reflects Fitch's overall concerns for the U.S. residential servicing industry which include the ability to maintain high performance standards while addressing the rising cost of servicing and changes to industry practices, which are likely to be mandated by regulators and other parties.

Finally, the rating reflects changes Fitch made to its servicer rating category weightings, which was instituted for all forward mortgage servicers in 2011.

The rating was determined in accordance with Fitch's criteria 'U.S. Residential and Small Balance Commercial Mortgage Servicer Rating' and 'Global Rating Criteria for Structured Finance Servicers' which are available on the Fitch Ratings web site at 'www.fitchratings.com'.

As of Feb. 29, 2012, Financial Freedom's servicing portfolio consisted of 145,939 loans with an unpaid principal balance of approximately $24.7 billion. The reverse portfolio is composed of 69% GSE loans (based on unpaid principal balance), 16.2% non-agency RMBS, 9.3% third-party servicing, and 5.3% owned loans.

OneWest is a wholly owned subsidiary of OneWest Bank Group, LLC, which was founded in March 2009 by a consortium of investors including Paulson & Co and J.C. Flowers & Co. IndyMac Mortgage Services (IndyMac), another division of OneWest, operates materially separate from Financial Freedom and maintains its own operations and systems. Financial Freedom has been servicing reverse mortgage product for 19 years and has operations in Austin, TX and Kalamazoo, MI.

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Fitch Affirms Financial Freedom's U.S. RMBS Servicer Rating; Assigns Positive Outlook