Press Releases

In the first report of its kind, the Center for Responsible Lending examines consumer lending markets across-the-board and finds that—despite major gains in regulatory reforms—predatory lending continues to undermine American households trying to rebuild their finances after the recession. View or download the report. The State of Lending in America and its Impact on U.S. Households ( State of Lending) paints a picture of working families struggling to manage debt while coping with stagnant incomes and a substantial decrease in wealth. The report covers major CRL findings in recent years and

The Center for Responsible Lending and the Financial Services Roundtable today asked Congress to extend the Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act, which is set to expire at year's end. "This tax law has bi-partisan support and is critical to helping homeowners and communities struggling with the ongoing foreclosure crisis," the two organizations said in joint letters to House and Senate leaders. "Furthermore, the housing market is beginning to show signs of a recovery, and expiration of this law would threaten the recovery." Read the full letters >> For more information: Kathleen Day at (202)

Statement of CRL President Mike Calhoun on today's report by HUD on the FHA's financial status FHA has played a critical role during the housing crisis and the economic downturn. It provided credit to families who otherwise would not have been able to buy homes. This has helped new home owners, but also helped stabilize neighborhoods and communities and boost the economic recovery overall. It is essential that FHA continue to fulfill this role, especially as the recovery continues. It is also essential that FHA operate on a financially sound basis. FHA has already instituted changes so that

Foreclosures across the United States have drained nearly $2 trillion in property value from surrounding households, more than half of it from African-American and Latino homeowners, a new study from the Center for Responsible Lending finds. The report, "Collateral Damage: The Spillover Costs of Foreclosures," updates CRL's research on the economic harm that homeowners suffer by living near foreclosed properties—the "spillover" cost. Also, for the first time, the research examines the impact in minority neighborhoods. Read the full report. The spillover cost of loans that entered foreclosure

Statement of CRL President Mike Calhoun about the complaint filed yesterday by the Residential Mortgage-backed Securities Working Group, a task force that was formed in January by the Justice Department: "The complaint filed against Bear Stearns, now owned by JPMorgan Chase, is a welcome step in an ongoing investigation of Wall Street investment banking activities leading up to the financial crisis. This is the first action taken by this federal task force to bring accountability and relief to homeowners and others who have suffered the devastating consequences of uprooted families, defrauded

The latest Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) survey shows positive trends in the housing market, with delinquencies and foreclosures down from last year. However, the millions of foreclosures still ahead will continue to erode communities and slow economic recovery. The need for aggressive and fair loan modifications remains as strong as ever. In addition, policymakers will sabotage growth and recovery if they leave underwater families stuck in high interest rate loans. About one quarter of all households that hold a mortgage are now underwater. Refinances remain out of reach even for

Restoring the US housing market is critical to our nation's economic recovery. That is why we are disappointed with the Federal Housing Finance Agency's (FHFA) announcement today that it will not permit targeted forgiveness of loan principal balances for struggling homeowners. This decision means that principal reductions are not an option for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans even when reducing principal balances would return more money to those entities than any other type of modification. This is a lost opportunity to stabilize housing markets and property values by giving more homeowners a

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Financial reforms enacted in response the financial meltdown remain popular with Americans likely to vote in 2012, a new opinion poll by Lake Research Partners shows. The poll was commissioned by AARP, the Center for Responsible Lending (CRL), Americans for Financial Reform (AFR) and the National Council of La Raza (NCLR). Saturday (July 21, 2012) marks the two-year anniversary of the Dodd-Frank Act, which created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). Key survey findings include the following: Voters favor the Dodd-Frank financial reform law by a 53-point margin

The recent Government Accountability Office (GAO) report on the Independent Foreclosure Review (IFR) process reveals serious flaws that threaten to undermine the program's success. The IFR is intended to compensate borrowers for mistakes their mortgage servicers made in the foreclosure process. The report critiques the public outreach that has been conducted for the IFR, under which federal banking regulators have ordered 15 major mortgage servicers to review loans in foreclosure in 2009 and 2010 in order to find any mistakes. The IFR has the potential to help as many as 4.3 million families.

Today's Department of Justice fair lending settlement with Wells Fargo Bank is welcome news, and highlights the benefits of new mortgage rules to combat predatory lending. The DOJ settlement of $175 million settles charges that Wells Fargo steered about 4,000 African-American and Hispanic families into higher-cost subprime mortgages while white borrowers with similar qualifications received safer, cheaper prime loans. DOJ also found that about 30,000 people of color paid more for their mortgages in fees and rates because of their race or ethnicity. New and pending mortgage originator rules