This got missed due to the Bear Stearns circus…..
Option One Mortgage sold for $1.1 Billion
Billionaire investor Wilbur Ross has reached an agreement to acquire the mortgage loan servicing business of H&R Block’s Option One Mortgage, forming the second largest mortgage servicing company in the United States.
The $1.1 billion deal adds to the acquisition by WL Ross & Co. of American Home, giving the company $95 billion in mortgage financing. The deal is expected to close by May 30. “We’ve been focusing on the mortgage area, and on the monoline insurance people. We have not been focusing on the brokerage investment banking companies,” Ross told CNBC.
“I think it’s very, very hard, particularly from the outside, to figure out what one of these is worth.”
Option One currently services about $53 billion of subprime mortgages, ranking it the fourth-largest in the nation.
Perhaps the sub-prime shakeout is moving faster than people thought ? Why would you buy the servicing rights if people aren’t paying their monthly payments?
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