A percentage of each mortgage payment made by a borrower to a mortgage servicer as compensation for keeping a record of payments, collecting and making escrow payments, passing principal and interest payments along to the note holder, etc. Servicing fees generally range from 0.25-0.5% of the remaining principal balance of the mortgage each month.
|||In addition to earning the actual servicing fee, in most cases, mortgage servicers also benefit from being able to invest and earn interest on a borrower's escrow payments as they are collected until they are paid out to taxing authorities, insurance companies, etc. Mortgage servicing rights trade in the secondary market much like mortgage-backed securities.
