Rocket Sues UWM Over Alleged "Bounty" on Mr. Cooper Book

Days after Rocket announced a $9.7B deal to acquire Mr. Cooper, I listened in on Mat Ishbia’s weekly sales huddle. He told brokers that UWM had already cut off contact w/ Mr. Cooper, one of its primary subservicers. But there were about 100K loans that UWM previously sold to Mr. Cooper, most being ultra-low rates from the boom years.

“There are some loans that are over 5.5% [in] rate,” he said. “All of those loans that were sold to them, I want you guys to refinance them.”

Ishbia also announced a big pricing incentive - 100 bps to reclaim UWM-originated loans serviced by Mr. Cooper. “I’ll lose money just for fun,” he said. “I want you guys to take advantage & grow.”

In New York City on Thursday, Rocket filed a lawsuit claiming that UWM had no legal right to solicit loans sold to/subserviced by Mr. Cooper. And fun or not, Rocket wants UWM to pay up for the damage it allegedly caused – to the tune of $100M.

We’ve got all the details. This is a special Thursday edition for Mortgage Scoop Insiders; I’ll be sharing a copy of the lawsuit for paid subscribers. We’ve also got the latest on PMI market share ticking down & a mortgage tech scoop involving Stewart.

Private mortgage insurance activity moderated in Q1 ‘26, driven primarily by increasing refinance activity which historically has lower PMI rates. During the quarter, PMI covered $70.3 billion original unpaid principal balance (“Original UPB”) of newly insured GSE mortgage-backed securities compared to $76.6 billion in Q4 ‘25 and $57.4 billion in Q1 ‘25; accounting for 34.6% of total Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac issuance, decreasing modestly from 36.1% in Q4 ‘25 and 38.2% in Q1 ‘25.

The share of purchase money mortgages with PMI was 47.3% in Q1 ‘26, compared to 46.4% in Q4 ‘25 and 45.8% in Q1 ‘25. The share of refinance loans with MI was 17.1%, compared to 17.0% in Q4 ‘25 and 10.1% in Q1 ‘25.

The average FICO score of insured mortgages stood at 756, compared to 756 in the prior period and 754 a year prior. The share of mortgages under $200K with MI was 22.1%, while loans with a balance between $200k-$300k was 33.2%, and loans with a balance greater than $300k was 36.4%. 

This report is brought to you by Milliman. Milliman provides strategic and quantitative consulting services across the mortgage market with expertise in origination, servicing and capital investment.

Source: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac MBS Data Disclosure. Note: This data is separate and independent from Milliman ‘s quarterly Private Mortgage Insurer (PMI) industry report. Quarterly totals do not incorporate or relate to insurer-specific financial statements or published results.

Between January & June ‘24, Mr. Cooper paid UWM $773M to acquire the servicing rights to roughly 182K mortgages w/ about $65B UPB, the lawsuit says. The complaint alleges that almost immediately after pocketing that money, UWM launched a coordinated campaign to solicit refinances from those very same borrowers & "claw back" the loans, destroying the value of the rights it had just sold.