Warren Joins Brown, Colleagues to Press FHFA to Ensure Access For Low-income Borrowers and Borrowers of Color
Washington, DC -- United States Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) joined Senator Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), ranking member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, along with Senators Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), and Mark Warner (D-Va.), today in sending a letter to Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) Director Mark Calabria, urging the Enterprises to renew their focus on facilitating safe, affordable refinance loans to all, including low-income borrowers. The lawmakers stressed that it is more important now than ever that the Enterprises are dedicated to serving the entire housing market, including low-income homeowners and homeowners of color.
“The Enterprises play a vital role in facilitating access to affordable mortgage loans. At a time when families are facing economic uncertainty, we must ensure that those affordable loans benefit the low-income borrowers who need them,” wrote the lawmakers.
Since the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak, Senator Warren has pressed the Trump Administration to respond effectively to deliver the robust set of resources needed to address this public health emergency, including mortgage, foreclosure, and eviction relief for homeowners and renters.
She cosponsored a bill in March 2020 with Senator Brown that would fill the gaps in the CARES Act relief by instituting a more comprehensive suspension of mortgage and other debt collection.
In April 2020, Senator Warren published a Medium post with Senator Brown pushing for consumer debt protections, including expanded and extended forbearance and foreclosure moratorium for homeowners.
In April 2020, she also wrote to the credit reporting agencies with Senator Schatz to gain more information on how COVID-19-related defaults were harming consumer credit.
She also cosponsored legislation in May 2020 to provide $100 billion for an emergency rental assistance fund to help renters remain safely in their homes.
In July 2020, Senators Warren and Schatz wrote to Wells Fargo following reports about the bank placing borrowers who are not delinquent on their loans in mortgage forbearance programs without their consent and putting consumers at risk of greater financial hardship in the midst of one of the worst economic collapses in history. In late October 2020, Senator Warren obtained and released new details and documents on Wells Fargo's dangerous practice of entering borrowers into forbearance without their consent.
In September 2020, Senator Warren sent a letter to Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Director Kathy Kraninger regarding the agency’s failure to use its authority to ensure that borrowers are aware of the mortgage relief options they are legally entitled to during the COVID-19 pandemic.
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