"And as conservator of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, “the Enterprises," we oversee operations and strategic decisions in greater detail, directing them to preserve and conserve their assets while fulfilling their charter purposes and responsibilities."
"We have now seen that the risk-blind leverage buffer was set so high that, together with the leverage requirement, it eclipsed the risk-sensitive aspect of the rule. As a result, it could provide the Enterprises with incentives to pursue and retain more risk."
"The Enterprises are now rebuilding their own capital to ensure that they have the resources to fulfill their mission to keep housing finance markets liquid, in both good times and bad."
"By taking advantage of lower interest rates, borrowers can reduce the share of their income they have to spend on housing costs. And given that these are already borrowers with an Enterprise-backed mortgage, they can access these financial benefits with minimal additional risks or costs to the Enterprises or taxpayers.
This should be an urgent priority, as we are seeing significant numbers of lower income and minority Enterprise borrowers stuck in rates 30 to 60 percent higher than the current average. There are even a surprising number of Enterprise borrowers who have been diligently paying the mortgages they received in the 2000s but are still having to pay rates of more than 6 percent. To assist these borrowers in lowering their monthly payments, the Enterprises will remove the 10-year seasoning cap from the original program."