HOUSTON (Oct. 13, 2004) - Stewart Mortgage Information (SMI) announces the Stewart Master Residential Junior Loan Policy known as eQuick(SM), designed to provide lenders with a lower-cost ALTA title insurance product providing limited coverage for junior lien mortgage loans.
"As the refinance market has fallen off, lenders continue to push their home equity and second lien loan products to generate new business," said Kevin Gugenheim, SMI president and chief operating officer. "Their dilemma has been whether to pay first-lien title coverage rates or go uncovered with traditional uninsured title products. Our new eQuick Policy offers a significantly lower-cost title insurance solution for those junior lien loans and it is generated electronically to provide more efficient customer service."
SMI will issue the eQuick policy in those states where it has been approved by the state Department of Insurance and according to the following qualifying criteria and loan parameters:
- Primary residence one-to-four units and second homes one unit
- No commercial or multi-family properties
- Fee simple property ownership
- Property size 25 acres or less
- Maximum loan amount $500,000 - total line of credit for HELOCs not to exceed $500,000
- Available for second liens, both closed-end and HELOC
- Maximum CLTV is 100 percent
This product is currently available in most of the high-volume origination states and more states will be added as the eQuick Policy is authorized by such state's Department of Insurance.
For more information on eQuick or any other SMI products, call (888) SMI-4415, e-mail smiprod@stewart.com or visit http://smi.stewart.com. All of SMI's products and services are also available through Stewart Title affiliated and independent agents.
About SMI
Stewart Mortgage Information (http://smi.stewart.com) is a wholly owned subsidiary of Stewart Information Services Corp. (NYSE-STC). Incorporated in 1994, SMI is a leading provider of mortgage information and services that accelerate loan origination and improve the performance of the post-closing function. SMI offers its services to lenders based on the life cycle of the loan process - from origination through post-closing to servicing.
About Stewart
Stewart Information Services Corp. is a technology driven, strategically competitive, real estate information and transaction management company. Stewart provides title insurance and related information services through more than 7,800 issuing locations in the United States and several international markets. Stewart meets the needs of the real estate and mortgage industries through the delivery of information services required for settlement using e-commerce. These services include title reports, flood determinations, document preparation, property reports and background checks. Stewart also supplies post-closing services to lenders, automated county clerk land records, property ownership mapping and GIS for governmental entities. Stewart provides expertise in tax-deferred exchanges. More information about Stewart can be found at http://www.stewart.com/.
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