The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau sent out a warning letter to 44 mortgage lenders and mortgage brokers on Thursday over issues surrounding compliance with the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act.
The bureau stated that it has “information that appears to show they may be required to collect, record and report data about their housing-related lending activity, and that they may be in violation of those requirements.”
Those requirements fall under HMDA, which was originally enacted in 1975, and requires many financial institutions to collect data about their housing-related lending activity.
This includes home purchase loans, home improvement loans and refinancings that they originate or purchase, or for which they receive applications.
HMDA also requires financial institutions to report to the appropriate federal agencies and make the data available to the public, which regulators can use for various oversight reasons.
“Financial institutions that fail to report mortgage information as required make it harder to identify and address discriminatory lending,” said CFPB Director Richard Cordray. “No mortgage lender that is required to report their loan data can avoid this responsibility.”
In October 2015, the CFPB published its changes to the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act. There are three major changes coming in 2017, according to Alice Alvey, Mortgage U senior vice president, who outlines the changes here.
One of the three that Alvey notes concerns which companies must file. “I don’t know if lenders are really aware that more lenders will have to file than in the past,” Alvey said.
The CFPB identified these 44 companies by reviewing available bank and nonbank mortgage data. A sample of the warning letter can be found here.
The bureau added that companies can tell the bureau if they think the law does not apply to them.
The CFPB, in sending these letters, made no determination that a legal violation did, in fact, occur.
