Former FHA Commissioner Brian Montgomery’s support couldn’t have come at a more important time for the reverse mortgage industry.
In his latest opinion piece for Mortgage News Daily, he calls on representatives in Washington, DC, to look beyond the budgetary and actuarial concern of the $250 million subsidy request for FHA’s reverse mortgage program. The “$250 million is a rounding error in a proposed 2011 federal budget of $3.8 trillion” he says. “The reverse mortgage product has at its very core an essential social purpose.”
Montgomery believes that reverse mortgages help address the growing concern of how the growing senior population will be able to age in a comfortable and secure environment.
He ends with the following:
My message is clear: OMB or the Congress needs to quickly, finally, and absolutely resolve the appropriation concern which has helped bring about too much uncertainty within the HECM program. That stalemate has been bad for hundreds of thousands of seniors who are struggling during these weak economic times and quite frankly have very few, if any, other options that offer the quality of life that the reverse mortgage does.
The House Committee on Appropriations has provided $150 million for the HECM program for FY 2011 but whether the Senate will provide any funds is still unknown. Lets just hope Congress takes Montgomery’s advice and supports the program.
Definitely worth the read.
HECMs Stuck in Reverse. HUD Considers “Two Product” Solution
