If you’re a California Bureau of Real Estate (CalBRE) or California Department of Business Oversight (DBO) mortgage loan originator (MLO) who has to complete eight hours of continuing education (CE) every year to keep your endorsement current, a couple key changes are headed your way.

Required topic lists

Currently, 8-hour CE courses must cover:

  • three hours of federal mortgage-related law and regulations;
  • two hours of ethics, consumer protection and fraud;
  • two hours of nontraditional lending; and
  • one hour of elective topics (one hour of DBO-specific elective topics, for DBO MLOs).

Those general guidelines are set by federal law, and remain in place. However, beginning in 2018, NMLS is requiring specific topics to be studied as part of the eight-hour CE requirement.

NMLS will review the required topic list and release new required topics in the first quarter of each year, to impact CE taken the following year (e.g., in the first quarter of 2018, NMLS will release the topics to be taken in 2019).

Required topics to be taken in 2018 are:

Topics Intended to Satisfy the 3 Hours of Federal Mortgage-Related Laws

Truth-in-Lending Act (TILA), 12 CFR Part 1026 (Regulation Z)

  • Comprehensive review of permissible fees and finance charges
  • Advertisement requirements
    • Mortgage Loan Originator and Real Estate Agent
    • Mortgage Loan Originator and Title/Settlement Company
    • Mortgage Loan Originator to consumer
  • Loans covered by the Truth-in-Lending Act
  • Permissible annual percentage rate tolerances
  • Refinancing scenarios with rights to rescind certain types of transactions
  • Finance charge overstated on initial Loan Estimate
    • Regulation Z, 12 C.F.R. §1026.4(b) and 12 C.F.R. §1026.4(c)
    • Regulation Z 12 C.F.R. §1026.4(e)(1)
  • Finance charge understated on initial Loan Estimate
    • Regulation Z, 12 C.F.R. §1026.18(d)(1)

Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act (RESPA), 12 CFR Part 1024 (Regulation X)

  • Comprehensive knowledge of the prohibitions, limitations and exemptions set by RESPA
  • Types of loans to which RESPA is applicable
  • Settlement services
  • Bona fide discount points
  • Foreclosure process
  • Changes that can be made to the Loan Estimate and Closing Disclosure
  • Federal Finding 7: Prohibited payments in connection with Marketing Service Agreements.
    • Section 8 of RESPA, 12 U.S.C. § 2607(a)
    • Regulation X, 12 C.F.R. § 1024.14(e)
    • 12 C.F.R. § 1024.14(g)(2)

Topics intended to Satisfy the 2 Hours of Ethics, Fraud, and Consumer Protection

  • Failed to comply with Bank Secrecy Act/Anti-Money Laundering and Suspicious Activity Report filing requirements.
    • Title 31 C.F.R. § 1010 and 1029

This does not impact courses taken in 2017 for the 2017 renewal season. (Need NMLS CE for 2017? Check out our offerings here.)

Biometric signatures

Second, beginning mid-August of 2017, NMLS will require students taking online self-study CE to authenticate their identity with a biometric signature when signing in to their online CE, as well as throughout the CE course.

For more information, including videos on how the biometric signature requirement will work, check out: https://biosig-nmls.zendesk.com/hc/en-us

Want to see how secure it is? Biosig will pay you $500 if you can authenticate the sample signature on their website.