subject: Bank Of America Fair Housing Act Violationsthe Trouble Continues [print this page] The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) issued a press release Monday morning alleging that Bank of America is guilty of discriminating against borrowers with disabilities, as reported by CBS Money Watch.
This allegation, along with slew of others against Bank of America, does not look good for the nations power bank.
Bank of America imposed unnecessary and burdensome requirements on borrowers who relied on disability income to qualify for their home loans and required some disabled borrowers to provide physician statements to qualify for home mortgage loans, HUD claimed in the CBS report.
The recent foreclosure fraud settlement was in response to the largest U.S. banks preying on their customers who need help with foreclosure and now accusations of discrimination are only making the situation even worse.
Bank of America reps responded saying, there is no basis to allege that Bank of America has engaged in a systemic practice of discriminating on the basis of disability in connection with mortgage lending, according to Reuters.
What claims will come next?
California Creates Homeowner Bill of Rights:
California Attorney General, Kamala Harris decided to take action and create six new pieces of legislation to give homeowners rights that will protect them from unfair mortgage lending practices, as reported in Bloomberg.
This is a unique period in time, Harris told Bloomberg reporters. We have reached probably the pinnacle of the mortgage crisiss damage to California, she said, citing more than two million homeowners who owe more on their mortgages than their homes are worth. There is work we can do to fix that, and this legislation is one piece of that.
Harris explained that the new legislation builds on the settlement and will help prevent more foreclosure fraud abuse in the future.
There are still millions in mortgage default but the new legislation will offer extensive help with foreclosure for those homeowners in need.
The legislation will offer homeowners in foreclosure a single point of contact for information, and impose a $10,000 penalty for robo-signing, in which mortgage firms and their contractors have vouched for thousands of foreclosure documents without verifying their accuracy, reported Bloomberg.
