The Federal Communications Commission has issued a baffling final rule restricting the way servicers can collect on or service student loans, mortgages and other debts owed to the federal government.Specifically, the rule implements a key provision in the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 amending the Telephone Consumer Protection Act to exclude robocalls from the TCPA consent requirement if they are made solely to collect a debt owed to or guaranteed by the federal government.The TCPA generally requires a caller to obtain “prior express consent” from the call recipient before making a telemarketing call or an auto-dial call to the recipient’s landline or cell phone.However, the mortgage industry raised concerns that TCPA’s consent requirement could create potential liability for important servicing calls that could help homeowners save their homes, which prompted Congress to pass the Budget Act amendment. Last month, the FCC specifically excluded the federal government from the TCPA’s consumer protections by ruling that the government is not a “person” subject to the TCPA. Here is where the FCC rule gets confusing. commission is authorized to adopt rules to “restrict or limit the number and duration” of any wireless calls to collect debt owed to the federal government.”

Major industry trade groups are asking FHA and VA to suspend proposed guidelines for energy-improvement loans and give stakeholders an opportunity to comment. In a joint letter, 11 trade groups warned that the proposed agency guidelines regarding Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) loans raises serious concerns that must be resolved before implementation of any PACE guidance. Prior to the issuance of the new guidelines, both FHA and VA prohibited the financing or refinancing if there was a lien other than the FHA-insured or VA-guaranteed mortgages. PACE programs are available in 19 states but most are in California. They provide financing for home improvements and clean-energy upgrades that would result in more efficient use of water and electricity, and ultimately savings for homeowners. The PACE obligation is repaid through a property-tax assessment, which takes a ...

The FHA has announced new streamlined procedures to help delinquent homeowners avoid foreclosure and stay in their homes. The agency is revising loss-mitigation procedures servicers use when evaluating and choosing the best home-retention options for delinquent borrowers by reducing waiting time for results. The new streamlined procedures are designed to enhance servicers’ ability to evaluate foreclosure-avoidance alternatives, especially for the FHA-Home Affordable Modification Program (FHA-HAMP). Specifically, FHA will require servicers to convert successful three-month trial modifications into permanent modifications within 60 days instead of the average four to six months. Borrowers who have three missed mortgage payments would be able to opt for a partial claim to bring their arrearages current versus the previous four-month minimum. In addition, the FHA will eliminate the ...

Mortgage Company President Charged with Defrauding Ginnie Mae. Robert Pena, president and founder of the now-defunct Mortgage Security Inc., was charged in federal district court in Boston for allegedly bilking Ginnie Mae out of nearly $3 million. MSI was an approved participant in the Ginnie Mae mortgage-backed securities program, pooling eligible single-family mortgages and selling the securitized products to investors. The firm also serviced the underlying loans. In 2011, Pena allegedly began diverting borrower payments and huge loan-payoff amounts into secret accounts, which he used to fund personal and business activities. Likewise, he is said to have funneled borrowers’ escrow funds and mortgage-insurance premiums into other personal accounts. In total, Pena pocketed $3 million due Ginnie Mae, which had to pay investors whose investments it had guaranteed, according to the ...

The CFPB’s TILA/RESPA Integrated Disclosure Rule continues to have mixed results, at least from the perspective of the nation’s mortgage originator community. According to the recently released results of a survey by the National Association of Realtors of mortgage originators during the second quarter of 2016, delays attributed to TRID eased between the first and second quarters of the year, as did lenders’ reluctance to offer pre-approval letters, while cancellations ticked up. Originators were asked, since April 1, what share of their company’s mortgage transactions had been delayed or cancelled due to a TRID-related issue versus non-TRID issues. Mortgages delayed due to TRID ticked barely down, from 1.8 percent in 1Q16 to 1.7 percent in 2Q16. In the fourth quarter ...

The Federal Communications Commission recently promulgated final rules that restrict how companies can attempt to collect on delinquent agency mortgages, federal student loans and other debts owed to the federal government, including through the use of so-called robocalls. The new rules limit the number of robocalls to wireless numbers, including text messages, to three per month. The new rules also only allow robocalls concerning debts that are delinquent or at imminent risk of default, unless there is prior express consent otherwise. The new rules require that, absent consent, callers only call the individual who owes the debt, not his or her family or friends. This includes limiting the number of robocalls allowed to reassigned numbers. The new rules reiterate that ...

Most of the small-entity participants in the review processes run by the CFPB before it came out with four major mortgage rules felt they were hurried by the process and unsatisfied with the final results, the Government Accountability Office said in a recent report. The GAO took a look at the experience of the 69 Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act (SBREFA) panel participants involved in evaluating the likely effects of the CFPB’s TILA/RESPA Integrated Disclosure rule (TRID), the mortgage servicing regulation, its loan originator compensation rule, and the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act regulation. Of the 57 small-entity representatives GAO interviewed, “two-thirds stated not enough time was allotted to discuss at least one of the topics on the panel agenda ...

New legal requirements enacted in the state of New York in the wake of the financial crisis pose particular compliance challenges for mortgage servicers, according to a new report by analysts at S&P Global Ratings. The S&P team recently reviewed a series of laws the state legislature passed in June that attempts to address several issues related to “zombie” foreclosures, which refers to the phenomenon of a servicer initiating foreclosure on a vacant property but not going so far as to actually take title. Urban community activists complain such properties languish unsold for a prolonged period of time, contributing to neighborhood blight in communities least able to handle it – hence, state lawmakers decided to act.One resulting requirement “imposes conditions ...

One mortgage lender recently inquired of Michael Goldhirsh, director of legal and regulatory compliance for the Lenders Compliance Group, as to whether the definition of “application” in the CFPB’s TILA/RESPA Integrated Disclosure rule (TRID) triggers or otherwise affects reporting under the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act. In a recent blog posting, he replied: “The short answer is that receipt of some or all of the six pieces of TRID application information does not necessarily trigger an application for purposes of HMDA reporting.” Goldhirsh went on to explain that Regulation C defines an application for HMDA reporting purposes as an oral or written request for a home purchase loan, a home improvement loan, or a refinancing that is made in accordance with ...

The CFPB is considering whether to propose a rule that would require registration of nonbank financial institutions, according to a Request for Information (RFI) the bureau posted on the Federal Business Opportunity website recently. As part of this process, the bureau is considering whether to procure a comprehensive and interactive online web-based registration system. “Such a system would allow nonbank financial institutions supervised or regulated by the CFPB to apply for, amend, update, or renew a registration online using a single set of uniform applications and would allow the CFPB to process these registration applications and amendments through automated workflows,” according to the RFI. Such a potential registration system might also be used to collect financial and operational data as ...