The Federal Housing Finance Agency, with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, has announced a series of changes to the 
Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP). This program was designed to be able to help people who were in a position of negative equity. Now, it someone is upside down on their home, there will be no limit to how far upside down they are in order to qualify for these loans. This program will continue to be available to borrowers with loans sold to the Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac on or before May 31, 2009 with current loan-to-value (LTV) ratios above 80 percent.
Here’s a summary of the most significant changes to the HARP program:
• Eliminating certain risk-based fees for borrowers who refinance into shorter-term mortgages and lowering fees for other borrowers;
• Removing the current 125 percent LTV ceiling for fixed-rate mortgages backed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac;
• Waiving certain representations and warranties that lenders commit to in making loans owned or guaranteed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac;
• Eliminating the need for a new property appraisal where there is a reliable A VM (automated valuation model) estimate provided by the Enterprises; and
• Extending the end date for HARP until Dec. 31, 2013 for loans originally sold to the Enterprises on or before May 31, 2009.
This change, coupled with serious talk of the Fed doing more quantitative easing involving purchasing mortgage backed securities, could be mean BIG opportunities for people who, while well qualified as borrowers, have been locked out of being able to get today’s more favorable interest rates. To find out if a loan is owned by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, first find the property’s standardized address by going to the United States Postal Service website, click on “lookup a zip code,” and find the properties “standardized address.” Then, enter that address into these lookups to see if there’s a match:
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