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TRANSACTIONS WITH RELATED PARTIES
12 Months Ended
Dec. 31, 2014
Related Party Transactions [Abstract]  
TRANSACTIONS WITH RELATED PARTIES
TRANSACTIONS WITH RELATED PARTIES
 
Through January 16, 2015, William C. Erbey served as our Chairman as well as the Executive Chairman of Ocwen and Chairman of each of HLSS, Residential and AAMC. Effective January 16, 2015, Mr. Erbey stepped down as the Executive Chairman of Ocwen and Chairman of each of Altisource, HLSS, Residential and AAMC and is no longer a member of the Board of Directors for any of these companies. As of December 31, 2014, Mr. Erbey owned or controlled approximately 29% of the common stock of Altisource, approximately 14% of the common stock of Ocwen, approximately 1% of the common stock of HLSS, approximately 4% of the common stock of Residential and approximately 28% of the common stock of AAMC. As of December 31, 2014, Mr. Erbey also held 873,501 options to purchase Altisource common stock (all of which were exercisable), 3,620,498 options to purchase Ocwen common stock (3,370,498 of which were exercisable) and 87,350 options to purchase AAMC common stock (all of which were exercisable). Accordingly, as a result of Mr. Erbey’s positions and the continuing common ownership, these companies have been and are related parties of Altisource.

Ocwen
 
Revenue
Ocwen is our largest customer. Ocwen purchases certain mortgage services and technology services from us under the terms of the master services agreements and amendments to the master services agreements (collectively, the “Service Agreements”) with terms extending through August 2025. The Service Agreements, among other things, contain a “most favored nation” provision and the parties to the Service Agreements have the right to renegotiate pricing. In connection with our March 29, 2013 acquisition from Ocwen of the fee-based businesses of Homeward Residential, Inc. (“Homeward”) and the April 12, 2013 transaction with Ocwen related to the fee-based businesses of Residential Capital, LLC (“ResCap”) (see Note 5), our Service Agreements with Ocwen were amended to extend the term from 2020 to 2025. Further, as part of the amendments, Ocwen agreed not to establish similar fee-based businesses that would directly or indirectly compete with Altisource’s services with respect to the Homeward and ResCap businesses. During 2014, we agreed with Ocwen to apply a negligence standard with respect to indemnification obligations arising out of property preservation and inspection services. Previously, Altisource and Ocwen applied a gross negligence standard with respect to these indemnification obligations. The impact of changing the negligence standard did not have a material effect on our results of operations. In addition, Ocwen purchases certain origination services from Altisource under an agreement that extends through January 2017, subject to termination under certain conditions. We settle amounts with Ocwen on a daily, weekly or monthly basis depending upon the nature of the service and when the service is provided.

Related party revenue primarily consists of revenue earned directly from Ocwen and revenue earned from the loans serviced by Ocwen when Ocwen designates us as the service provider. Related party revenue from Ocwen as a percentage of segment and consolidated revenue was as follows for the years ended December 31:
 
 
2014
 
2013
 
2012
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Mortgage Services
 
67%
 
71%
 
68%
Financial Services
 
27%
 
30%
 
<1%
Technology Services
 
41%
 
49%
 
42%
Consolidated revenue
 
60%
 
65%
 
59%

 
We record revenue we earn from Ocwen under the Service Agreements at rates we believe to be market rates as we believe they are consistent with the fees we charge to other customers for comparable services and/or fees charged by our competitors.

We earn additional revenue on the portfolios serviced by Ocwen that is not considered related party revenue when a party other than Ocwen selects Altisource as the service provider. For the years ended December 31, 2014, 2013 and 2012, we recognized revenue of $256.0 million, $161.9 million and $125.4 million, respectively, on the portfolios serviced by Ocwen that are not considered related party revenue.

Cost of Revenue

At times, we use Ocwen’s contractors and/or employees to support Altisource related services. Ocwen generally bills us for these contractors and/or employees based on their fully-allocated cost. Additionally, we purchase certain data relating to Ocwen’s servicing portfolio in connection with a Data Access and Services Agreement. The Data Access and Services Agreement may be renegotiated and may be cancelled by either Altisource or Ocwen with 90 days prior written notice. Ocwen bills us a per asset fee for this data. For the years ended December 31, 2014, 2013 and 2012, Ocwen billed us $38.6 million, $20.0 million and $13.5 million, respectively. These amounts are reflected as a component of cost of revenue in the consolidated statements of operations. On December 31, 2014, we notified Ocwen that we are canceling the Data Access and Services Agreement, effective March 31, 2015.

Selling, General and Administrative Expenses

We provided certain other services to Ocwen and Ocwen provided certain other services to us in connection with Support Services Agreements. These services include such areas as human resources, vendor management, vendor oversight, corporate services, operational effectiveness, quality assurance, quantitative analytics, tax and treasury. The Support Services Agreement with Ocwen Mortgage Servicing, Inc. extends through September 2018 with automatic one-year renewals thereafter. The Support Services Agreement with Ocwen Financial Corporation extends through October 2017 with automatic one-year renewals thereafter. Billings for these services were generally based on the fully-allocated cost of providing the service based on an estimate of the time and expense of providing the service or estimates thereof. For the years ended December 31, 2014, 2013 and 2012, we billed Ocwen $4.5 million, $2.8 million and $2.7 million, respectively, and Ocwen billed us $6.1 million, $4.6 million and $3.2 million, respectively. These amounts are reflected as a component of selling, general and administrative expenses in the consolidated statements of operations.

Unsecured Term Loan
 
On December 27, 2012, we entered into a senior unsecured term loan agreement with Ocwen under which we loaned $75.0 million to Ocwen.  Payments of interest were due quarterly at a rate per annum equal to the Eurodollar Rate (as defined in the agreement) plus 6.75%, provided that the Eurodollar Rate was not less than 1.50%.  On February 15, 2013, Ocwen repaid the outstanding principal amount of this loan and all accrued and unpaid interest and the term loan was terminated.  Interest income related to this loan was $0.8 million and $0.1 million for the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2012, respectively (no comparative amount for 2014).

Transactions Related to Fee-Based Businesses
 
On January 31, 2013, we entered into non-binding letters of intent with Ocwen to acquire certain fee-based businesses associated with Ocwen’s acquisitions of the Homeward and ResCap servicing portfolios. Ocwen acquired the Homeward servicing portfolio on December 27, 2012 and the ResCap servicing portfolio on February 15, 2013. Altisource acquired the Homeward fee-based businesses from Ocwen on March 29, 2013 (see Note 5). Altisource entered into an agreement with Ocwen on April 12, 2013 to establish additional terms related to our services in connection with the ResCap fee-based businesses (see Note 5).
 
Correspondent One and HLSS
 
In July 2011, we acquired an equity interest in Correspondent One S.A. (“Correspondent One”). Correspondent One purchased closed conforming and government guaranteed residential mortgages from approved mortgage bankers. On March 31, 2013, we sold our 49% interest in Correspondent One to Ocwen for $12.6 million.  Prior to the sale to Ocwen, we provided Correspondent One certain finance, human resources, legal support, facilities, technology, vendor management and insurance risk management services under a support services agreement. For the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2012, we billed Correspondent One less than $0.1 million and $0.4 million, respectively (no comparative amount for 2014).  These amounts are reflected as a component of selling, general and administrative expenses in the consolidated statements of operations. We also provided certain origination related services to Correspondent One. We earned revenue of $0.1 million and $0.3 million for the years ended December 31, 2013 and 2012, respectively, for these services (no comparative amount for 2014).
 
HLSS is a publicly traded company whose primary objective is the acquisition of mortgage servicing rights and related servicing advances, loans held for investment and other residential mortgage related assets. Under a support services agreement, we provide HLSS certain finance, human resources, tax and facilities services. For the years ended December 31, 2014, 2013 and 2012, we billed HLSS $0.9 million, $0.7 million and $0.6 million, respectively. These amounts are reflected as a component of selling, general and administrative expenses in the consolidated statements of operations.
 
Residential and AAMC
 
Residential and AAMC were spun-off on December 21, 2012 and their equity was distributed to our shareholders on December 24, 2012 and they are each separate publicly traded companies. Residential is focused on acquiring and managing single family rental properties by acquiring sub-performing and non-performing residential mortgage loans as well as single family homes at or following the foreclosure sale throughout the United States. AAMC is an asset management company providing portfolio management and corporate governance services to Residential.
For purposes of governing certain ongoing relationships between Altisource, Residential and AAMC, we entered into certain agreements with Residential and AAMC. We have agreements to provide Residential with renovation management, lease management and property management services. In addition, we have agreements with Residential and AAMC to provide services such as finance, human resources, facilities, technology and insurance risk management. Further, we have separate agreements for certain services related to income tax matters, trademark licenses and technology services.

For the years ended December 31, 2014 and 2013, we billed Residential $16.0 million and $2.6 million, respectively (no comparative amount for 2012). This excludes revenue where we are retained by Ocwen to provide services to Residential’s loans serviced by Ocwen. That revenue is included in related party revenue from Ocwen. For the years ended December 31, 2014 and 2013, we billed AAMC $0.1 million and less than $0.1 million, respectively, under the services agreements (no comparative amount for 2012). These amounts are reflected in revenue in the consolidated statements of operations. In addition, for the years ended December 31, 2014 and 2013, we billed AAMC $0.9 million and $0.5 million, respectively, under the services agreements (no comparative amount for 2012). These amounts are reflected as a component of selling, general and administrative expenses in the consolidated statements of operations.