Truce Called
The gadfly shareholder Greenlight Capital Inc. agreed to call off its proxy fight with New Century Financial Corp. in return for a seat on the Irvine, Calif., real estate investment trust's board and permission to increase its stake.
The deal was announced Wednesday. Greenlight will stop trying to get three people nominated to the board, and New Century will add an eleventh seat to the board for Greenlight president David Einhorn, who will become a director March 31.
He will stand for reelection at the annual shareholders meeting, scheduled for May 10.
Greenlight also agreed not to initiate a proxy contest against New Century while Mr. Einhorn is a director, and to vote its shares in favor of the three directors up for reelection at the annual meeting.
New Century will let Greenlight increase its stake to as much as 19.6% of the outstanding common stock. Other investors are limited to 9.8%.
"I look forward to sharing my perspective as the board oversees effective allocation of the company's capital to the most attractive risk-adjusted opportunities, and to working with the other board members to enhance per share value for all stockholders," Mr. Einhorn said in a press release.
Ocwen Suits
Several lawsuits set to go to trial this year in Alabama accuse Ocwen Financial Corp.'s servicing unit of failing to remove default notice charges from borrowers' accounts and other fee charging problems.
Beasley, Allen, Crow, Methvin, Portis & Miles PC, a Montgomery law firm that has filed 37 cases against Ocwen, said in a press release Wednesday that the servicer agreed in April 2004 with the Office of Thrift Supervision to stop charging default notice fees but did not remove previous default notice charges from borrowers' accounts. (Ocwen gave up its thrift charter in July.)
One of the plaintiffs, Debbie Long, whose case will go to trial in Russell County, alleges that she was charged a $95 default fee on several occasions, as well as foreclosure fees of over $900, even though no foreclosure was initiated. Ms. Long also says that the West Palm Beach, Fla., company charged her late fees for payments sent on time, and told credit bureaus that the payments were late.
Moreover, Ms. Long alleges that Ocwen failed to disclose what fees, finance charges, and penalties she would be charged, as well as other facts necessary for her to keep her loan current and prevent foreclosure and negative reporting to credit bureaus.
Ocwen did not respond to a request for comment.
PMI Promotions
PMI Group Inc.'s mortgage insurance unit promoted two managing directors to regional vice presidents.
The Walnut Creek, Calif., company said Wednesday that it had promoted Todd Pittman to regional vice president for the Northeast. A day earlier it said it had promoted Susan King to the same position for the Southeast.
Mr. Pittman started at PMI in 1987 as an account executive and was later promoted to area sales manager. Ms. King began her career at PMI in 1984 as an underwriting manager and has since held various sales management positions.
No-Burn Discount
Chase Home Finance, a unit of JPMorgan Chase & Co., said it will offer a loan rate and discount reduction plan to California commercial and custom homebuilders that use No Burn of California's fire and mold retardant in new home construction.
No Burn of California is a Rowland Heights dealer of No-Burn Inc., a Wadsworth, Ohio, maker of fire and mold retardants that are sprayed on wood during the framing phase of home construction or renovation. The company also has products that can be applied to drywall or other surfaces that can accept paint. The mold products carry a 10-year warranty.
No-Burn Inc. said it hopes that its products will eventually be required for new homes, much like the smoke detector.
Motorists Mutual Insurance Co. of Columbus, Ohio, offers a 15% discount on homeowners' policies for consumers in certain states who have No-Burn installed.
Trumped Up
It looks like Donald Trump's well-known bravado is shared by the president of his year-old residential and commercial mortgage brokerage, Trump Mortgage LLC.
The business, whose formation was announced late last month, is headquartered at the Trump Building on Wall Street.
E.J. Ridings, its president and chief executive, has been making the publicity rounds. He told Commercial Property News on March 2 that his lender had yet to close on any commercial deals, but he described four on which it is working.
This week Newsday reported some even stronger statements from Mr. Ridings.
The Trump "brand is one of the strongest, if not the strongest, in the world," he told the paper. "It's definitely the strongest real estate brand."
That claim is debatable, but not nearly as likely to raise eyebrows as the one that followed: "What we realized in our research is that the mortgage industry on the national level is kind of rudderless. There's no brand on the national level."
Er, ever hear of Countrywide Home Loans?
(Mr. Ridings said he could not discuss the matter Wednesday.)
