Atlanta-based Ocwen Financial Corp. and private equity firm WL Ross & Co. LLC entered into an agreement whereby Ocwen will acquire Homeward Residential Holdings Inc., including its various residential mortgage loan servicing and origination operating subsidiaries, for approximately $588 million in cash and $162 million in Ocwen convertible preferred stock.
Homeward services about 422,000 mortgage loans with an aggregate unpaid principal balance of over $77 billion. Homeward was organized by WL Ross & Co. in 2007 and is the result of several major platform combinations: American Home Mortgage Servicing, Option One Mortgage Co. and a large servicing portfolio from Citi Residential Lending.
‘The acquisition of Homeward significantly advances Ocwen's twin strategic growth initiatives to add high return servicing assets to its portfolio and expand origination capacity to provide for a sustainable source of future growth,’ says Ocwen's Executive Chairman William Erbey. ‘Homeward brings with it a global servicing platform as well as a growing origination business that is already operating at a $10 billion annual run-rate after launching in late 2011.’