Housing
More on Housing
Below is an the opinion piece by Congresswoman Waters that was posted to her Huffington Post blog page. She authored this piece in response to the recent LA Times op-ed on multi-state settlement:
By Rep. Maxine Waters, Progressive Congresswoman from California
Posted: 11/17/11 11:32 AM ET
By Associated Press, Updated: Tuesday, November 1, 2:51 PM
WASHINGTON — About 4 million homeowners who may have been improperly foreclosed upon in 2009 and 2010 are getting an opportunity to have their cases reviewed. Whether they will be reimbursed is up to the same lenders who are accused of moving too swiftly to seize their homes.
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency said Monday that mortgage services will begin sending out letters this month that ask borrowers if they want their case reviewed.
Congresswoman Waters (CA), Ranking Member on the Subcommittee on Capital Markets and Government Sponsored Enterprises, today led 15 of her colleagues in the House of Representatives, renewing her call for U.S. bank regulators to publicly release information regarding the steps that mortgage servicers are taking to prevent illegal foreclosure practices.
Mr. Speaker, I must congratulate the Tea Party for extorting the deal made in their image, and their image alone. The cuts will be deep, they will be lasting, and they will weaken an already-depressed economy.
What's clear is that the Tea Party is so ideologically driven to kill government that they're willing to kill the private sector, kill jobs, and kill growth in the process.
Congresswoman Waters (CA), Ranking Member on the Subcommittee on Capital Markets and Government Sponsored Enterprises, today led 11 of her colleagues in the House of Representatives urging U.S. bank regulators to publicly release information regarding the steps that mortgage servicers are taking to prevent illegal foreclosure practices. An identical letter was sent by U.S. Senator Robert Menendez (NJ), Chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Housing, Transportation, and Community Development, and nine additional Senators.
Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), a senior member of the Financial Services Committee and a leading champion for homeowners, delivered the following remarks today during a Subcommittee on Housing, Insurance, and Community Opportunity Hearing on "Legislative Proposals to Determine the Future Role of FHA, RHS and GNMA in the Single-and Multi-Family Mortgage Markets."
She also reintroduced H.R. 1977, her legislation to reform the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), which overwhelmingly passed the House in the 111th Congress by a vote of 406-4.
Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) yesterday reintroduced H.R. 1567, the Foreclosure Prevention and Sound Mortgage Servicing Act of 2011. Congresswoman Waters has introduced similar legislation since the 110th Congress, and has long maintained that the servicing industry is broken. By reintroducing and updating the bill, Congresswoman Waters continues to demonstrate her commitment to ending the foreclosure crisis and holding servicers accountable.
by Jon Prior
Mortgage servicers may have to review as much as $535 billion in loans for possible remediation to borrowers who suffered financially from improper foreclosures, according to an estimate from the investment bank Keefe, Bruyette & Woods.
Remediation was one of the requirements of the consent orders signed between 14 mortgage servicers and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Reserve after an investigation into foreclosure problems. The regulators found the problem had spread industry wide.