Another day, another major lender cutting mortgage jobs
Another day, another major lender cutting mortgage jobs.
PNC Financial Services Group laid off an undisclosed number of employees in its mortgage unit last week, according to a report by the Pittsburg Business Journal. The layoffs come as lower refinance demand cuts into lenders’ mortgage business.
“We continuously adjust our staffing to meet the cyclical demands of our business,” Marcey Zweibel, PNC vice president and senior manager of external communications, told the Journal Friday. “Currently, PNC is responding to industry trends and lower refinance volume by reducing some mortgage positions. We re-deployed as many employees as possible as part of this process.”
Those employees not lucky enough to be reassigned will get 60 days’ severance, the Journal reported.
Layoffs in big lenders’ mortgage units have become routine in recent months, as higher interest rates strangled refinancing volume. Last week, PHH Corp. – the nation’s 6th-largest provider of residential retail mortgages – announced the layoffs of 365 employees at its Jacksonville, Fla., office and an undisclosed number of employees at its Mount Laurel, N.J., headquarters.
Last month, Citigroup announced the layoffs of about 1,000 employees in its mortgage division. Wells Fargo & Co., the nation’s largest mortgage lender, has eliminated more than 4,000 mortgage jobs over the last few months. Bank of America has cut about 2,100, and JPMorgan has announced plans to eliminate about 19,000 positions – about 15,000 in its mortgage unit – over the next two years.
PNC entered the mortgage industry in 2009 when it acquired National City Corp., according to the Journal
