By Kevin Drum March 31, 2010 Over at the Washington Independent, Martha White has a good piece about tax preparers who prey on low-income filers by hard selling refund anticipation loans, which typically boast effective interest rates of anywhere...
By Gloria Carr March 31, 2010 ELGIN — Daniel Taylor worked for Chrysler for 27 years, had a family, had excellent credit, bought a house and never missed a house payment. Then he lost his job. Taylor has been...
The key to success of the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP) lies in the long-term sustainability of the modifications offered to troubled borrowers. If the modification results in a payment that is still unaffordable or the home is...
By Mark LawtonMarch 29, 2010 Many residents in Franklin Park and Northlake are getting their tax refunds back a little early but at a much higher cost. Those residents use refund anticipation loans, essentially a loan against a person’s...
Keeping families in their homes during and after the foreclosure process mitigates the negative impact of vacant properties on communities, reduces lenders’ costs in securing and maintaining properties, and provides stability for families as they figure out the next...
The Department of the Treasury released its eighth report card on how mortgage lenders are doing modifying loans for eligible homeowners under the government’s Making Home Affordable program (see the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh report...
By Katherine Lucas-SmithMarch 22, 2010 “The borrowers werent risky so much as the loans were risky,” said Michael Calhoun, the president of the Center for Responsible Lending in offering a rebuttal to the argument that the foreclosure crisis was...
By Jacquelyn RyanMarch 22, 2010 Justin Kawa is the new face of the depressed real estate market. The young marketing executive’s two-bedroom condo in the upscale neighborhood of Lincoln Park, which he put on the market for $359,000 last...
By Adam DosterMarch 19, 2010 The prolonged battle to close a loophole in Illinois’ payday lending reform law is reaching a critical juncture. In the past week, 11 Senate Democrats have joined State Sen. Kim Lightford (D-Maywood) as co-sponsors...
The General Assembly is preparing to vote on long-needed reforms for high-cost, long-term installment loans, and end the loophole in the Payday Loan Reform Act, and they need to hear from you. The Consumer Installment Loan Reform Act will...