Fair Lending Shake-Ups: CFPB Vacates Townstone Settlement, FHFA Ends GSEs' Special Purpose Credit Programs — The Consumer Finance Podcast
The Latest on Junk Fees and New York's Foreclosure Abuse Prevention Act — The Consumer Finance Podcast
The Latest on HUD's Disparate Impact Rule - The Consumer Finance Podcast
Title Insurance and Your Transaction
Law Brief®: Robert Wolf, Alexander Tiktin and Richard Schoenstein Discuss the Continuing Foreclosure/Eviction Moratorium
Credit Eco to Go Podcast - Not a Normal Mortgage Crisis: How the Mortgage Industry Weathered the Pandemic
Not a Normal Mortgage Crisis: How the Mortgage Industry Weathered the Pandemic
In January 2025 the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) issued Mortgagee Letter 2025-06 revising servicing and claims requirements and loss mitigation options for FHA insured mortgage loans effective...more
Legislation to prohibit so-called “trigger leads” in the homebuying process once again has been reintroduced in the House and Senate....more
On March 18, the state of Arkansas enacted HB 1238 (the “Act”) to amend the state’s foreclosure law to allow mortgagors to recover attorney’s fees if a foreclosure sale is set aside due to a mortgagee’s failure to comply with...more
Financial institutions that purchase mortgage loans in Maryland, including securitization trusts and other secondary market purchasers, face a new requirement to obtain a state license. The Maryland Office of Financial...more
On January 10, 2025, the Maryland Office of Financial Regulation issued emergency regulations revised to clarify that “passive trusts” holding residential mortgage loans must obtain a Mortgage Lender License and if the trusts...more
On January 10, 2025, the Maryland Office of Financial Regulation (OFR) issued formal guidance asserting that assignees of residential mortgage loans—including certain “passive trusts” that acquire or obtain assignments of...more
Recently, the CFPB filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan against a real estate company, and an independent real estate brokerage firm and its brokerage affiliates and CEO, alleging...more
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”) filed an action on December 23, 2024, against Rocket Home Real Estate LLC (“Rocket Homes”), a real estate brokerage and affiliates (“Defendant Brokerage”) and an individual...more
The CFPB recently issued a final rule increasing the asset exemption threshold under the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA)....more
On October 29, New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin and the state’s Division on Civil Rights (DCR) released a report detailing the findings of a multi-year investigation into Republic First Bank (Republic) and its...more
A recent study, Government Litigation Risk and the Decline in Low-Income Mortgage Lending, provides further evidence that the law of unintended consequences reigns supreme, particularly in the realm of public policy. The...more
As any bank professional regulatory compliance professional knows redlining is the hottest issue today and has been since Attorney General Merrick Garland announced the “Combatting Redlining Initiative” in October 2021. Since...more
Recently, the Ohio Division of Financial Institutions released a letter to repeal prior guidance banning mortgage professionals from acting as both a mortgage professional and a real estate agent in the same transaction. This...more
On June 17, 2024, FHA announced in draft Mortgage Letter 2024-12 a proposed revision to its Defect Taxonomy to clarify that fraud or material misrepresentation involving a sponsored Third-Party Originator (TPO) is a Tier 1...more
In a recent article in National Mortgage Professional entitled "Manufacturing Fair Lending”, former chief of the Housing and Civil Enforcement Section at the Department of Justice under Attorney General William Barr, Paul...more
In emails in recent months we've warned bankers about the extremely aggressive enforcement of anti-redlining policies. This is becoming more and more obvious every day as more banks get threatened with referral to the DOJ....more
On May 30, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) issued a request for information (Request) regarding alleged “junk fees” in closing costs charged by mortgage lenders and related settlement service...more
The New York County Supreme Court recently held that in the event of foreclosure, a receiver can be appointed, regardless of necessity, when the parties have contracted for such appointment. 24 West 57 APF LLC (“Defendant”)...more
Federal Housing Administration (“FHA”) approved lenders and mortgagees will no longer be required to register their branch offices. The US Department of Housing and Urban Development (“HUD”) published a final rule (the “Final...more
There has been much understandable handwringing about the new CRA and its complexity as well as the high CRA exam failure rate predicted by regulators based on the new assessment areas and the higher performance standards...more
As I write this article the Department of Justice is pursuing a record-breaking number of “redlining” cases against banks and mortgage lenders. The “Anti-redlining Initiative” was announced October 22, 2021, by Attorney...more
Bills have been introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives (H.R. 4198) and the U.S. Senate (S. 3502) to amend the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) to curtail the practice of trigger leads with mortgage loans....more
The CFPB recently released a report entitled Data Point: 2022 Mortgage Market Activity and Trends based on 2022 data reported by lenders under the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA)....more
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Director Rohit Chopra recently addressed The Mortgage Collaborative National Conference recounting the Congressional response to the mortgage industry crisis that began in 2008 that...more
Borrowers who go through the process of obtaining an FHA-insured multifamily loan generally come to the same conclusion: the juice is worth the squeeze. At the end of the day, they get to enjoy a unique blend of benefits (35...more