No quick fix for US subprime mortgages
Updated: 2007-12-07 22:16
Rising home foreclosures are a headache for politicians and a danger for the economy.
Bush tried to shift blame for the crisis to the Democratic-led Congress.
"The Congress has not sent me a single bill to help homeowners," Bush said.
One measure would give the Federal Housing Administration more flexibility; a second would change the tax laws temporarily to help people who have a portion of their mortgage forgiven by banks.
Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., complained the criteria for Bush's mortgage freeze are too narrow to help most distressed homeowners and worried that legal challenges by investors might stall the effort.
"While we certainly all hope this will be a shot in the arm for the housing slump, it is hardly a panacea," Schumer said. "There are too many families who may be left out, too much left up to the voluntary willingness of the private sector and too little disclosure and transparency to ensure families who do qualify are being helped."
Under the plan outlined Thursday, the rate freeze offer would be available only to people who have not missed any mortgage payments at their introductory interest rate. It also only would apply to loans taken out between 2005 and this past July 31 and scheduled to rise to higher rates in Jan. 1, 2008, and July 31, 2010. To make sure speculators don't get the break, the rate freeze offer applies only to people living in their homes.
The idea behind the administration-negotiated plan is that the five-year freeze will buy time for the housing sales and prices to start rising again. Such a rebound would enable homeowners to refinance their current adjustable rate mortgages into fixed-rate loans with more affordable monthly payments. But some people who want to buy homes and have been priced out of the market are upset that there's no help in sight for them.
Of the nearly 3 million subprime adjustable-rate loans surveyed by the Mortgage Bankers Association in the third quarter, a record, 18.81 percent of them were past due. A record, 4.72 percent of the loans entered into the foreclosure process during that period.
Meanwhile, there still is the possibility that investors, who were counting on bigger returns from the higher rate resets, will balk at extending the duration of the lower rate.
George Miller, executive director of the American Securitization Forum, whose members include investors, ratings agencies and other financial players, backed the White House's effort and developed streamlined procedures for lenders to follow when sorting through borrowers' requests for relief. He was hopeful lawsuits could be avoided, but he struck a note of caution.
"Certainly, there is no complete insulation from legal exposure," Miller said.
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