Government

Although HUD's has been instrumental in fighting housing discrimination and poverty, it has failed to meet its original goal to “not only to relieve the symptom of poverty but to cure it and, above all, to prevent it," President Lyndon Johnson said.

Approximately three-quarters of mortgage industry professionals believe that today’s regulatory environment prevents them from lending to creditworthy borrowers.

Home prices appear to be losing some of their spark, slowing down to a marginal increase of 0.3 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis in August compared to last month.

Freddie Mac and Quicken Loans recently announced that they have joined forces to pilot several new initiatives aimed at helping provide more Americans the opportunity to achieve homeownership, while also building a smarter American mortgage finance system.

Consumers are applying for mortgage loans using more government applications compared to last week, and while the industry adjusts to the TILA-RESPA Integrated Disclosure rule, applications are expected to become more volatile.

As part of Washington’s continued focus on reducing regulatory burden for Main Street, the House Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit Subcommittee convened on Wednesday to discuss a series of recently proposed bills aimed at achieving this goal.

HUD announced Wednesday that it is issuing a proposed rule to protect consumers being harassed in housing. The newly proposed rule would formalize standards to bring about claims under the Fair Housing Act. The rule, also known as "Quid Pro Quo and Hostile Environment Harassment and Liability for Discriminatory Housing Practices under the Fair Housing Act,” was published in the Federal Register today for public comment.

Officials of the Obama administration recently rejected investors' calls to reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to end the seven-year conservatorship between the two GSEs.

The total amount recovered from litigation against banks that sold toxic residential mortgage-backed securities to corporate credit unions has now reached $2.2 billion with two recently announced pending settlements, according to an announcement from the National Credit Union Association, chief regulator for credit unions in the United States.

Single-family housing starts increased in September 2015, while authorizations and housing competitions decreased, according to new residential construction statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau and HUD released Tuesday.