fannie-mae

Thanks to federal regulations, when you dispute an account on your credit report and the dispute is resolved in your favor, the credit reporting agency is required to remove or correct the account. Credit reporting agencies often don't do this, though, and the Washington Post notes that it can come back and interfere with your next home loan application.  More »

Earlier today a former Fannie Mae exec and the current head of the FHA gave conflicting testimonies to Congress about the health of the mortgage insurer—particularly about whether or not it's going to require a taxpayer bailout in the next couple of years.  More »

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are preparing to hand out $210 million in taxpayer-funded retention bonuses to 7,600 employees. No bonus will exceed $1.5 million, but more than half of all Freddie and Fannie employees will receive an average bonus exceeding $24,000.  More »

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac can foreclose on people's houses again. There was much fanfare when they were banned from doing so back in December, but not a peep on March 31st when the moratorium ended. Funny, that. [The Washington Independent] (Photo: Colin Tobin)  More »

The Obama Administration announced new details about its massive foreclosure relief program — and the Washington Post says that it includes a refinancing program for homeowners with little equity in their homes, but who otherwise would be able to refinance. The Post has a quick interactive tool that will help you to determine whether or not you qualify for the program.   More »

With the economic stimulus (or "e-stim," as we've been calling it) signed into law, President Obama turns his attention to the foreclosure crisis. At an event in Arizona today, he announced the following proposals to help homeowners.  More »

Bloomberg says that Fannie Mae will loosen standards for refinancing in the hopes that more homeowners will be able to take advantage of historically low interest rates.   More »

As a rule, banks generally consider renters to be a liability and want nothing to do with them. When a property goes into foreclosure, these renters are usually unceremoniously tossed out and the building resold. Now Fannie Mae has announced a new program whereby renters in good standing will be allowed to stay in their apartments — if the property is owned by the government-controlled home funding company.  More »

As is our habit, we provided Ad Age with a list of our Top 10 Business Debacles of the Year. Are you ready for the pain?  More »

Good news for renters who've been dutifully paying their rent while their landlords failed to make the mortgages, and were facing eviction as a result: Fannie Mae will sign new leases with them. [NYT]  More »

The Federal Housing Finance Agency announced plans for allowing Fannie and Freddie to modify more of their loans. The mods will lower interest rates or lengthen the repayment schedule with the goal of bringing payments below 38% of household income. To qualify, borrowers must:  More »

The FBI has launched a fraud probe into Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Lehman Brothers and AIG. Sounds kinda like a move to placate the masses. "We're on it." No doubt in response to the seething outrage sweeping the nation over the size and audacity of the bailouts, however needed they might be. Sounds like an easy job. Sorta like dipping your hand in a barrel of ink and trying to pull up black stuff.  More »

The government said yesterday that it would forbid Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from paying their fired CEOs their separation payments or "golden parachutes." Experts estimate they were together up for $25 million. Political pressure had been mounting, with calls from both presidential candidates and other lawmakers to limit the departing execs' compensation. Coupling this with the news about the Fed not bailing out Lehman Brothers means only one thing, we've entered the funnest part of the sub-prime aftermath, the punishment phase!  More »

Oh dear, all that talk about Freddie and Fannie being "adequately capitalized" was utter bullshit and the government has now announced plans to place the failed government sponsored enterprises into conservatorship. That means the fate of the housing market and the global economy rest squarely on the shoulders of U.S. taxpayers.  More »

Fannie Mae is the nation's largest mortgage finance company and it's just not doing too well, says the AP. Increasing losses from foreclosures are wiping out Fannie's revenue.   More »

Scammers love to tap into national trends to put a new face on an old scam, and the "Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac Equity Prize Draw" scam spotted by the Louisville, KY BBB is no exception.  More »

President Bush signed a massive mortgage relief bill that will help hundreds of thousands of homeowners refinance their unaffordable mortgages into fixed rate government backed loans rather than lose their homes to foreclosure. The bill also put tighter reigns on Freddie and Fannie, says the Associated Press.  More »

This Sunday the Bush administration asked Congress to approve a "rescue package" that would give officials the ability to inject "billions of federal dollars" into Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. The Federal Reserve also announced that it would make its short-term lending programs available to Freddie and Fannie, said the NYT.   More »

Freddie and Fanny lost about half of their value overnight as investors became more certain that the government was going to have to bail out the two GSEs (Government Sponsored Enterprises.) The New York Times says that senior members of the Bush administration are considering a takeover of Freddie and Fannie that would leave their shares "worth little or nothing," and where taxpayers would pay "any losses on mortgages they own or guarantee."  More »

Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, the "government sponsored" enterprises that are supposed to bail us out of the current mortgage crisis, may be in danger of collapsing, according to William Poole, the former president of the St. Louis Federal Reserve, who told Bloomberg the companies are already "insolvent."  More »