Posts tagged congress

HR 2413 – “Safe and Sound”: The Bill to Reform Fannie and Freddie?

We’ll see.

H.R. 2413, supported by the NAR, is billed as:

To establish a sustainable Federal Secondary Market Facility for Residential Mortgages that is financed by private capital, to terminate the conservatorships of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and repeal the charter Acts of such enterprises, and for other purposes.

I’m trying to make sense of the bill today

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If We’re Paying for the Mortgages, Shouldn’t the Data be FOIA-able?

Section 1447 of the law calls for the Department of Housing and Urban Development to establish and maintain a comprehensive national database on foreclosures and defaults on mortgages and to make the information publicly available. The data is supposed to drill down to the census tract level and include the number and percentage of loans that are delinquent by more than 30 days; those that are in the foreclosure process; and those that are underwater.

… (a) Establishment- The Secretary of Housing and Urban Development and the Director of the Bureau, in consultation with the Federal agencies responsible for regulation of banking and financial institutions involved in residential mortgage lending and servicing, shall establish and maintain a database of information on foreclosures and defaults on mortgage loans for one- to four-unit residential properties and shall make such information publicly available , subject to subsection (e).


…For example: “47% of the mortgages in the Charlottesville MSA are more than 30 days delinquent (if it’s that high, I’ll eat one of my flip flops; I’d wager that number is less than 7%).

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Apparently the Tax Credit Closing Extension is Dead. For Now

Despite shaving another $22 billion off the price tag of H.R. 4213 , the unemployment insurance, jobs and tax extenders bill, the Democrats this afternoon failed for the third time in three weeks to defeat a Republican filibuster.

…Spooked by concern about deficits, the Senate shelved a spending bill that included an extension of unemployment benefits, suddenly cutting off a federal cash spigot opened by President Barack Obama when he took office 18 months ago.

… “In effect, I think what we’ve done is pull ahead a lot of sales,” de Ritis said.

…Still, the number is so bad that it makes a decent case for an extension and retuning of the tax credit, de Ritis said. (hat tip: CR ) *editor’s note: I’m going to move this post to the sideblog shortly.

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