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Rithm Capital<\/strong>, the Michael Nierenberg-headed real estate investment trust, appears to be getting into direct lending. The REIT bought $1.4 billion worth of unsecured personal loans from Goldman Sachs<\/strong>‘ Marcus business unit, Bloomberg reported<\/a> Thursday. <\/p>\n Rithm bought the loans at a discount, Nierenberg told the outlet. The portfolio of loans Rithm purchased were to borrowers with an average FICO<\/a> <\/strong>score of 735 and Nierenberg said he’s assuming losses between 8% and 10%.<\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019re pretty healthy borrowers who were just consolidating debt,\u201d said Nierenberg. \u201cIt\u2019s an opportunistic acquisition; we don\u2019t see pools like this come across very often.\u201d<\/p>\n Nierenberg told Bloomberg that Rithm is also looking to move into the direct lending space as banks face tightening regulations<\/a> from Basel III.<\/p>\n \u201cIf the regional banks continue to pull back, it could be an opportunity,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Rithm<\/strong>, the REIT that operates mortgage lenders and servicers NewRez<\/a><\/strong>, Caliber<\/a> <\/strong>and several other businesses<\/a>, said in May that it was considering spinning off the mortgage division to aid its flagging stock, which company executives described<\/a> as \u201cextremely undervalued.\u201d<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Goldman Sachs has had to eat hundreds of millions of dollars on its consumer unit Marcus. A week ago the bank sold $1 billion of personal loans<\/a> to alternative investment firm Varde Partners<\/strong>. Goldman also sold a $1 billion tranche in the first quarter, the investment bank disclosed in regulatory filings. <\/p>\n If it does get into direct consumer lending, Rithm will find some familiar faces in the independent mortgage bank world. Guaranteed Rate<\/strong> last year announced that it would be offering unsecured personal loans<\/a> to qualifying customers at competitive rates. <\/p>\n