Rave reviews for the Wealth Building Home Loan

The Wealth Building Home Loan (WBHL), a new approach to home finance, opened to rave reviews at the American Mortgage Conference held September 8-10.  Six leaders of national stature made favorable comments from the podium.

Lewis Ranieri, considered the “godfather” of mortgage finance, in his keynote address praised the WBHL:  “Fundamentally, what I find exciting is the wealth building nature of the product.  Anyone who knows me knows how concerned I am that too often the mortgage has been utilized as an ATM for a boat or big screen TV, as opposed to building equity; if we’re to meet the needs of Americans who desire a home, this type of SAFE experimentation will be critical.”

Carol Galante, FHA commissioner,David Stevens, Mortgage Bankers Association CEO and former FHA commissioner, Joseph Smith, monitor of the National Mortgage Settlement of the State Attorneys General and Lenders, and James Lockhart, former director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency also made note of the innovative approach taken by the WBHL.

Bruce Marks, CEO of the Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America (NACA), announced that the WBHL, which provides low-income borrowers a straight, broad highway to building wealth based on a 15-year, fully amortizing, fixed-rate loan, will be available in an initial rollout undertaken by NACA and the Bank of America within 60 days.

Long-time industry observer Tom LaMalfa, in an email, stated:

“In an industry in which few agree on much, there was remarkable agreement on the value of the WBHL among an array of industry leaders speaking at the AMC this week.”

Stephen Oliner (codirector of AEI’s International Center on Housing Risk) and I announced that additional WBHL pilots are in the works with lenders around the country.

Smith spoke extensively about the challenge in providing access to credit and home ownership, particularly among low- and moderate-income borrowers.  He asked:

“[I]s the thirty year fixed-rate mortgage what we need?  Contrary to the opinion of many people whom I admire and respect, the thirty year fixed rate mortgage is neither a Constitutional nor human right…. While it is a proven ‘affordability product’ of long standing, the thirty-year fixed-rate mortgage does not build equity very quickly. Further, a lot of things can happen to a borrower over those thirty years – job loss, health problems, divorce. [a]s Monitor of the National Mortgage Settlement, I have done a lot of listening in the last two and a half years; including to distressed borrowers, the people who represent them, and public officials who deal with the fallout from increased foreclosures and bankruptcies. What I have heard confirms what I know from prior experience: that one or two of those life issues – or, in many, many cases, the trifecta – have resulted in real financial crisis on a large scale. Absent substantial home equity at the outset, the thirty-year fixed rate mortgage increases the fragility of a borrower’s overall financial position and puts the borrower at risk for a very long time.”

Smith went on:

“The traditional answer to the concerns I have just expressed is to require a substantial down payment. That’s certainly effective – for the people who can afford it. But it reduces access to credit and home ownership, particularly among low- and moderate-income borrowers.  If we want to keep homeownership an option for an expanding portion of the population, we should build some additional features into the mortgage product to reduce fragility. At the very least, we should consider the inclusion of product features that allow and even encourage early equity build-up. In that regard, I am pleased to note AEI’s Wealth Building Home Loan.”

Steve and I created the WBHL to serve the twin goals of providing a broad range of homebuyers – including low-income, minority, and first-time buyers – a more reliable and effective means of building wealth than currently available under existing policies, while maintaining buying power similar to a 30-year loan.

A WBHL has a much lower foreclosure risk because of faster amortization and common-sense underwriting. Its monthly payment is almost as low as 30-year, fixed-rate loan while providing the buyer with more than 90 percent of the buying power. It requires little or no down payment and has a broad credit box, meaning sustainable lending for a wide range of prospective homebuyers. While the WBHL is designed to reduce default risk for all borrowers, this is a critical importance for borrowers with FICO scores in the range of 600-660.

The WBHL will help these borrowers reliably and sustainably build wealth.

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is courtesy of SNMC.

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