The reverse mortgage program can be a very valuable tool for addressing issues related to aging in place in the United States, as well as circumventing some problems related to the spread of COVID-19 in senior housing and nursing facilities. However, some issues including the volatility for the Federal Housing Administration and various servicing problems […]
Growing numbers of American seniors are carrying forward mortgage debt, an issue that is likely to become exacerbated due to the effects of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, as retirees are seeing many of their investments and accounts being negatively impacted by the national economic stand-still. This is according to data analysis from the Urban Institute […]
Reverse mortgage products represent the least popular option of extracting home equity compared with three alternative methods, including open-ended Home Equity Lines of Credit (HELOCs), cash-out refinance mortgages, and closed-end home equity loans. Reverse mortgage use can also vary significantly based on race and ethnicity due to a number of different factors. This is according […]
American research think tank the Brookings Institution hosted an event in Washington, D.C. Monday morning that included a wide-ranging panel discussion of reverse mortgages in America and across the world. The event also included the presentation of two research papers, diagnosing issues and prescribing potential solutions for headwinds faced by reverse mortgage products in the […]
In a rare assembly of reverse mortgage stakeholders, housing experts and members of Congress, a hearing convened Wednesday before the The U.S. House of Representatives Financial Services Subcommittee on Housing, Community Development, and Insurance to discuss the merits and areas of improvement of the federal Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) program. Newly drafted legislation, a […]
The share of homeowners who maintain a traditional forward mortgage is at 62.9 percent, accounting for the lowest level of such homeowners since at least 2005. This is in spite of the fact that the household-owned value of the housing market in the United States is at a record high of $26.12 trillion, and that […]
While a continuous stream of surveys continue to corroborate that seniors overwhelmingly prefer to age in place, making a determination about exactly the right place for them to age is a more difficult and complex issue to try and answer. This is according to a recently and privately convened panel of experts on aging and […]
Because of the high costs to the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) associated with the Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) program within the Mutual Mortgage Insurance (MMI) fund, FHA should focus on reducing costs by addressing losses on assigned loans as opposed to narrowing the program’s eligibility requirements. This is according to blog post released by […]
As workers get older, their employment becomes increasingly difficult to maintain even in a generally prosperous economic climate. This is according to a study conducted by the Urban Institute, and recently highlighted by the Boston College Center for Retirement Research. Workers over the age of 50 have a higher likelihood of encountering an involuntary job […]
The Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) program has been experiencing difficulties in securing greater volume over the past year, particularly since changes were made to principal limit factors (PLFs) and insurance structure (MIP) in October of 2017. HECM program observers and proponents have sometimes argued that separation of the forward and reverse mortgage programs under […]
