OCC Terminates Foreclosure-Related Consent Order for OneWest

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) announced the termination of the 2011 foreclosure-related consent order for OneWest Bank, having determined that the bank has satisfied the terms of the consent order.

OneWest was one of 12 mortgage servicers penalized by the OCC and the Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS) in April 2011 for deficient mortgage servicing and foreclosure practices. The OCC handed down enforcement actions against Bank of America, Citibank, HSBC, JPMorgan Chase, MetLife Bank, PNC, U.S. Bank, and Wells Fargo. The OTS penalized Aurora Bank, EverBank, OneWest Bank, and Sovereign Bank.

The consent orders handed down against the servicers were based on findings by an examiner during an interagency review of major mortgage servicers conducted during Q4 2010, at the height of the foreclosure crisis. The OTS reported at the time of the consent order in 2011 that OneWest serviced a portfolio of approximately $141 billion in residential mortgage loans.

At the same time the OCC announced the termination of OneWest's consent order, the agency announced that it had granted approval for the Pasadena, California-based bank to merge with CIT Bank, which is based in Salt Lake City, Utah. The name of the new merged bank will be CIT Bank, N.A.

OneWest was one of eight national banks included in the OCC's Q1 2015 Quarterly Mortgage Metrics Report released in late June. The OCC reported that the percentage of performing first-lien mortgages at the eight banks had increased from 93.1 to 94.2 percent year-over-year and that foreclosure activity had declined during that same period by more than 30 percent to just less than 300,000 loans.

Click here to view a copy of the original consent order against OneWest in April 2011. To view a copy of the consent order termination, click here.