legal & regulatory, news

Pending Bank Regulation Threatens Housing Recovery

I was pleased last March to see that Congress was not overreacting to the problems in the subprime markets, and allowing the free markets to correct themselves.

Well, that pleasure was short-lived. Yesterday, HR Bill 3915 was sent to the House for approval. Though well-intentioned, this bill as written, will further tighten credit just when homeowners need it the most. It will disqualify many from obtaining loans, limit competition, create regulatory barriers to innovation, exacerbate the rate of foreclosures and cause further billions of dollars of homeowner equity to vanish.

Everyone will be effected if this legislation passes. Many of you who are employed in the mortgage and real estate industries should be concerned about your jobs. Those of you who are not, are homeowners or dream of someday owning your own home. And, everyone has a stake in a quick economic recovery. If people can’t afford their homes, they will stop spending on consumer goods. Since US consumer purchases drive the world’s economy, this has the potential to push our economy into a broad and deep depresssion.

According to Representative Barney Frank, the House of Representatives will vote on HR Bill 3915, in February or March.  CONTACT YOUR CONGRESSMAN BY PHONE OR EMAIL, RIGHT NOW, and express you desire for him/her to VOTE AGAINST THIS LEGISLATION, unless certain wellmeaning but misguided language is corrected.

1) Sign the petition to Congress. http://www.petitiononline.com/Fix3915/petition.html
2) Contact your Congressman . http://capwiz.com/namb/dbq/officials/
3) Forward this email to everyone you know

There is another popular “No on HR 3915 petition addressed just to Arizona representatives. If you have already signed that one, please sign this one as well. This one is addressed to the entire congress.

The National Association of Mortgage Brokers has created a webpage that will allow you to look-up your congressman and quickly compose a letter from their template expressing your concern. It is at http://capwiz.com/namb/dbq/officials/ . Enter your zipcode and follow the link titled “ACTION ALERT! ACT NOW!”

For a thoughtfully considered summary and opinion of this bill, please visit the blog of a one of my Nevada colleagues: http://activerain.com/blogsview/258019/If-House-Bill-3915