Some smaller lenders will no longer be required to report Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data because of a new rule set by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
The final rule, amending Regulation C, increases the permanent threshold for collecting and reporting data about closed-end mortgage loans from 25 to 100 loans. This new rule will take effect July 1, 2020.
“MBA commends CFPB Director Kathy Kraninger and the Bureau’s increase in the HMDA transaction reporting threshold for closed-end mortgages from 25 to 100 loans,” said Robert Broeksmit, Mortgage Bankers Association president and CEO. “This rulemaking provides significant relief to many of our residential and commercial/multifamily members and has been a longstanding MBA advocacy priority.”
“Under these revised rules, HMDA reporting for 2020 is optional for lenders that did not meet the 100-loan threshold in either 2018 or 2019,” Broeksmit said.
Originally, the CFPB was expected to make this new rule in January, but later extended that timeline, saying the rule would be released sometime in 2020.
The final rule will also amend Regulation C to increase the permanent threshold for collecting and reporting data about open-end lines of credit from 100 to 200. But this will not take effect until Jan. 1, 2022.
That’s because there is currently a temporary threshold of 500 open-end lines of credit, which will expire at that time.
In 2018, the CFPB relaxed some of the requirements for the data collection and reporting stipulated by HMDA. The policy exempted insured depository institutions and credit unions that originated less than 500 closed-end mortgages or 500 open-end lines of credit in each of the two preceding years from certain HMDA reporting requirements.
Then in May 2019, the CFPB proposed easing HMDA reporting requirements even more. The CFPB proposed new HMDA rules that would increase the HMDA reporting threshold for mortgages, meaning some smaller lenders and credit unions may not have to report their lending activities, at all.
But now, this new rule brings the threshold back down to 200 open lines of credit after the temporary threshold expires.
“The bureau recognizes the operational challenges confronted by institutions due to the current COVID-19 pandemic,” the CFPB stated in its release. “The bureau anticipates that this final rule, once effective, will reduce regulatory burden on smaller institutions to help those institutions to focus on responding to consumers in need now and in the longer term.”
Back in March, the CFPB announced that temporarily, it will no longer require certain lenders to report quarterly HMDA information.
