The Mississippi Home Corporation began as a direct result of the Mississippi Home Corporation act of 1989. Its main purpose? Provide affordable and sustainable housing for the residents of Mississippi. The Mississippi Home Corporation acts a liaison agency between the Mississippi Governor, the Mississippi Legislature, the U.S. Congress and agencies throughout the U.S. to increase awareness of the serious plight Mississippi residents are facing.

To carry out this agenda the Mississippi Home Corporation has launched various programs to help homeowners and residents that wish to buy a home. These include the Mortgage Revenue Bond Program, the Mortgage Credit Certificate Program, the Down Payment Assistance Program and the Mississippi Home of Your Own Program among others. Let us look at each program individually.

Mortgage Revenue Bond Program and the Down Payment Assistance Program.

This program offers borrowers under the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) and the Department of Veterans Affairs with assistance on the 3 percent down payment required for a home purchase. This aid comes in the form of a second mortgage. The interest rate for this added loan is set at or below the going interest rate. The main benefit of this program is that it opens the housing market for borrowers who could otherwise not afford the down payment they needed to qualify for a mortgage.

Mortgage Credit Certificate Program.

The Mortgage Credit Certificate program helps homeowners qualify for a mortgage by reducing the Federal Income Tax they must pay.

Mississippi Home of Your Own (HOYO) Project.

The HOYO project focuses on residents with disabilities and their families. It aims to provide the financial counseling and financial support they need to qualify and keep their own homes.

These are only a few of the many programs under the Mississippi Home Corporation. Visit their official website for more information on these and other programs.

As you can see, there is not a lack of programs struggling homeowners and potential homeowners can apply for in Mississippi. We just looked at small selection of programs available. The key is to take matters into your own hands and find the help you need to either save your home or get the financing you need to buy one.

Finding a loan is a challenge for many Mississippi residents. Lenders, scared by the recent housing and debt crisis, have tightened their loan eligibility requirements. This means low and very low-income workers often find it impossible to find the finances to buy their own home. Federal and state programs are available for Mississippi residents and businesspeople.

The United States Department of Agriculture provides mortgage help for residents in rural areas. Rural areas are generally defined (although there is some flexibility) as municipalities with 10,000 residents and less. Besides the general programs applicable to all rural residents the USDA provides (section 502 Direct Loan) special help for residents affected by Hurricane Katrina. This help applies to residents affected by Katrina in Mississippi, Alabama, Texas and Louisiana– $17.8 million go for Mississippi while another $178 million will be allocated to 49 counties in the affected area.  The USDA also guarantees loans for single family housing, whether to build or purchase.

Homeowners with properties in need of repair can apply for the Section 504 Repair Loan and Grant. This program provides loans to low and very low income families. Senior citizens 62 and over are eligible for added programs with a total of $50 million dollars set aside for financing.

For more information on USDA housing programs visit the USDA’s official website.

The Small Business Association also has special programs for residents in disaster areas in the State of Mississippi. These programs, although not as heavily funded as other larger programs, seek to fill the gap between larger federal programs and insurance compensation in the most affected areas. The programs offer subsidized loans for homeowners with rates as low as 2.687% and terms of up to 30-years. These loans are designed to help towards the repair of real estate not covered by insurance. This includes the deductibles paid toward insurance claims. For more information on these and other programs call the Federal Emergency Management Agency at 1-800-621-3362 and ask for information on the SBA loans program or visit SBA’s official website.

Continue reading our next article for information on two mortgage aid programs providing help in the state of Mississippi: the Mississippi Home Corporation and the Housing and Urban Development Department.

Few states have been hit in the last years like the state of Mississippi. The housing and credit crisis has only been the latest financial crisis to hit the area; the final straw of an already battered community. If you are a homeowner with a mortgage or would like to buy a home, read on. In this series of articles, we are going to take a close look at the mortgage aid programs in Mississippi.

Our analysis will include programs offered by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the Small Business Administration, The Mississippi Home Corporation and the Housing and Urban Development Department. These programs are specific to the state of Mississippi and consider the special needs of Mississippi residents.

Foreclosure Avoidance.

Before we take an in-depth view of available programs, let us look at the basic steps Mississippi residents can take to avoid foreclosure. Your first step should be to hire professional help to get the advice you need to save your home. This advice does not have to be expensive; in fact, it can be free.

Contact a housing counselor in the state of Mississippi approved by the Housing and Urban Development Department and you can get the help you need for free. These counselors are trained to assess your financial situation and create a plan to rearrange your finances and avoid foreclosure. They have contact information for the major lenders in your area and can help you to negotiate a loan modification, short sale, mortgage refinance and other foreclosure avoidance methods with your lender.

If foreclosure is a real possibility, it may be time to hire a lawyer experienced in foreclosure law. A foreclosure is, after all, a lawsuit filed by your lender to claim the security of your mortgage—your home. Foreclosure can be a complicated process. The specific procedures change from state to state, so it is smart to hire a local lawyer with years of experience in foreclosure avoidance. Again, these services don’t have to be expensive. Contact the Mississippi’s Legal Services Resource Center and find out if you qualify for free or low-cost legal aid.

Foreclosure in Mississippi can follow a judicial (lawsuit filed at a court of law) or a non-judicial route. Non-judicial foreclosures are handled by a trustee—a person who manages and processes a foreclosure. In Mississippi foreclosures are fast; they usually take 90 days or less, and do not come with a redemption period after the foreclosure sale. This means the foreclosure sale is final and previous owners cannot recover their home once it is sold.

Find out more about mortgage aid programs in Mississippi in our next article.

Photo by bhautikjoshiWhat does it do?

This program works hand in hand with HAMP’s loan modification program. It is designed to help homeowners that are struggling to meet their mortgage payments because of a second mortgage on their home. The 2MP program helps homeowners reduce the payments on their second mortgage or even get rid of it altogether. 2MP does this by providing lenders with incentives to reduce interest rates, extend the term of the second mortgage to 40 years, or forgive a portion or the entire loan.

Eligibility

To qualify for a Second Lien Modification Program (2MP):

-       Your first mortgage must already have been modified under HAMP (see program 1 above).

-        The lender of the second mortgage must also be taking part in the Making Home Affordable Plan (i.e. Bank of America, Citi Mortgage, Chase, Wells Fargo and their subsidiary companies).

-       The second mortgage must have started before January 2009.

-       The mortgage must have a balance of more than $5,000 and monthly payments of more than $100.

Used in combination with an HAMP loan modification a 2MP second lien modification could significantly reduce your monthly mortgage expenses. Click here to find out if you qualify.

Photo by epicharmusTreasury Department is taking hits from all sectors, private, academic and government, for its handling of the housing crisis. The latest report produced by the Congressional Oversight Panel said Treasury’s response continued to lag behind the pace of the crisis.

Treasury has responded in two ways.  1) By pointing out the successes they feel the Making Home Affordable Loan Modification has achieved; namely, an increase in 35% of permanent loan modifications in March. This placed the total number of permanent loan modifications to 230,000 homeowners enjoying reduced mortgage payments and fixed interest rates. 2) By announcing it is still implementing new programs which should be more aggressive with the housing crisis. The problem is that big banks like JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo are not buying the new deals Treasury is proposing.

A centerpiece of the new loan modification program is the plan to increase the reducing of mortgage principals as a loan modification measure. Up to now the main methods banks and lenders have used to reduce mortgage payments have been increasing the term of the loan, reducing the interest rate of the mortgage, and changing variable and ARM interest rates to fixed interest rates. Clearly, this is not producing the results hoped for, so Treasury is suggesting lenders get more aggressive and is asking lenders and servicers to reduce the mortgage balance of underwater mortgages.

What does this mean?

Reducing the principal balance of a mortgage means forgiving a chunk of the money owed to the bank. For instance, if you have a mortgage of $100,000 for a house that is only worth $80,000, your mortgage is $20,000 underwater. This is also called negative equity, owing more than the value of the home. Treasury is suggesting that lenders consider reducing the mortgage balance for troubled homeowners who own underwater mortgages. Using our previous example a lender could decide to forgive the lender $20,000, bringing the mortgage out of negative equity. The theory is this would create a win-win situation. First it would allow banks to avoid stockpiling unsellable foreclosed homes. Second it would give borrowers a strong incentive not re-default on their mortgages.

A more radical version of this program is to apply principal balance reduction to mortgages that are not delinquent, that is, not behind on their payments, but have a large negative equity. This is the proposed modification that banks and lenders have more of an issue with. The worry is that reducing the mortgage balance of borrowers would give the wrong message to borrowers, which would receive compensation for borrowing irresponsibly. It would also undermine the chances of lenders taking the risk of providing new mortgages if they know the principal balance could be cut at any moment.

New Obama Government Mortgage Help Plan to Aid Americans

The Obama government on Friday introduced wide-ranging fresh initiatives to assist stressed home owners, potentially re-financing several million of these into fresh new government-backed mortgage loans together with reduced payments.

An additional component of the program is supposed to briefly decrease the actual payments associated with borrowers who’re unemployed and also searching for work. Furthermore, the government may motivate loan providers to write decrease the value of loans held by borrowers in modification programs.

The escalation in aid comes as the government is actually under rising pressure from Congress to be able to resolve the foreclosure turmoil, which is pressuring the economic system and positioning millions of Us citizens at threat of losing their houses. However the fresh initiatives could well spur protests amongst those who have kept up their own obligations and are not struggling.

At a White House briefing, authorities stressed that absolutely no new taxpayer cash would be used for the particular programs. Instead, cash to deliver incentives for mortgage servicers to participate will be drawn from the $50 billion designated to real estate in the Troubled Asset Relief Program.

Authorities said they expected the brand new programs, combined with the government’s current plan, to aid three to four million troubled property owners within the next few years.

In its statement, the Treasury mentioned the projects had been meant to “balance the need to help responsible homeowners struggling to stay in their homes, with the recognition that we cannot and should not help everyone.”

The administration’s previous efforts to control foreclosures have mostly recently been directed at borrowers who were suffering from monetary difficulty. But the biggest new initiative, which is furthermore likely to be one of the most controversial, can involve the government, with the Federal Housing Administration, refinancing financial products for borrowers who simply owe over their homes are really worth.

About eleven million homeowners, or even a 5th of these with home loans, are in this kind of position, referred to as being upside down. A few of these borrowers refinanced their houses during the boom and also took money out, making them vulnerable when prices dropped. Others simply had the misfortune to purchase at the peak.

Many of these financial products have been bundled up together and marketed to investors. Within the new plan, the investors would need to take failures, however may possibly be confident of having a lot more ultimately compared to when the borrowers went in to foreclosure. The F.H.A. might insure the newest financial products against the risk of default. The actual customer would once again possess a rationale to make payments instead of running away from a property.

The success of the F.H.A. element depends on the willingness of investors to get involved. If investors believe that a homeowner will keep on to pay, they might choose to not take the decline.

That may create a fight among borrowers and investors.

The strategy, if successful, might put taxpayers at greater risk. In the event that several extra borrowers move straight into F.H.A. loans, a renewed economic downturn in the housing market might send that federal government organization to the red.

The F.H.A. has already broadened its mortgage-guarantee program considerably in the previous 36 months as the housing problems deepened. It now insures more than 6 million borrowers, most of which made minimum down payments and therefore are now underwater.

The agency may use $14 billion in cash from the Troubled Asset Relief Program, most of which it could dangle in front of loan companies as incentives to take part.

Another major component of the program, in accordance in order to several individuals who described it, is going to be to motivate loan companies to write down the value of financial loans for borrowers in modification programs. So far, the government’s modification endeavors have centered on lowering rates of interest.

Lenders began providing primary forgiveness this past year on financial loans they held in their own portfolios. Within the fourth quarter, however, this process abruptly reversed itself, for reasons which are cloudy. The number of modifications which integrated principal reduction fell by half.

Bank of America, the country’s greatest bank, introduced this week that it would certainly forgive principal balances over a period of years on an original 45,000 stressed financial loans. One more element of the White House’s housing system will require lenders to provide unemployed individuals a reduction in their obligations for a bare minimum of three months.

The brand new initiatives would certainly expand the government’s present mortgage loan modification program, announced last year along with great fanfare. It’s led to less than 200,thousand individuals getting long term brand new financial products. As much as 7 million individuals are generally seriously overdue on their financial loans and at risk of foreclosures.

Whilst fewer people are beginning fall behind, the number of borrowers that are seriously affected is actually increasing. Within the fourth quarter, the number of households at the very least 90 days past due on their home loans swelled by 270,thousand, according to a report written Thursday through the comptroller from the currency and the Office of Thrift Supervision.

The amount of foreclosures in the 4th quarter rose 9 percent, to 128,859. An additional 38,000 owners discarded their houses in short sales, where the lender agreed to accept less than it was owed.

The federal government isn’t planning to obtain financial products for the F.H.A. refinance program, stressing that must be voluntary.

The administration recognizes that a few individuals finances have deteriorated so much that they are over and above help, the person said. People in that situation simply cannot afford the houses they are living in, the person said, even if the mortgages were reduced.

New Government Mortgage Help Plan to Aid Americans

Unemployment has taken its toll on Georgian, with Georgia actually 3rd inside the united states, having Thirteen percent of home loans more than one payment delinquent as of December. 31, in accordance with the Mortgage Bankers Association’s National Delinquency Survey.

Countrywide, the delinquency rate fell to a seasonally modified rate of Nine % coming from all mortgages unpaid as of the end of the 4th quarter. That’s down Seventeen basis points from the third quarter, but up 159 basis points from a year ago. A basis point is one-hundredth of a percentage point.

The MBA reported the actual decline within the 30-day delinquency rate is “a concrete sign” that the conclusion of the mortgage problems could possibly be nearby. Which is essential simply because mortgages that are 30 days past due usually function as major signal of significant delinquencies and foreclosures.

In Georgia, there has been 33,059 active trial mortgage loan modifications through January. Of them, 4,508 are actually permanently modified.

Atlanta is among the top Fifteen metro locations for HAMP activity, accounting for 3.2 % of total HAMP activity. The particular city had 30,285 active trial loan modifications through January. Of those, 3,692 were permanently modified.

California Government Mortgage Help

If you are reading this then you are no doubt one of hundreds of thousands of Americans with a mortgage that has become nearly impossible to maintain. The state of California is seeing the highest rate of foreclosure in the history of the mortgage industry. Whether you have lost your job, your income has changed or simply cannot afford your mortgage payment any longer, there are ways to get help.

Before seeking help, one important thing to remember is that banks do not want to take your home. Sure, when it comes down to it, the banks will foreclose to protect their interest but foreclosure is extremely costly to the banks and will often cause them to lose money. It is more beneficial for the banks to work with you rather than against you.

When you are having trouble paying your mortgage, there are many different options that you can turn to. There are currently many options for government mortgage help in the state of California. The help you seek will of course be dependent on certain guidelines and restrictions.

Here are just some of the options available to homeowners in California:
1. The Making Home Affordable Program – This program is the brainchild of President Obama. There are actually two parts to this program. The first is the Home Affordable Refinance. Under this plan, if you are making your mortgage on time each month but can’t refinance due to owing more than the home is worth, this option may be able to help you refinance into a more affordable rate. The second option is the Home Affordable Modification. This option is for those who are behind on their payments or actually already in the foreclosure process. This plan can also be used by those who have experienced a recent hardship. Under this option you can modify your payments to get you into a payment that you can better afford.

2. HOPE for Homeowners – The HOPE for Homeowners program is for borrowers who are having trouble making their mortgage payments and are facing foreclosure. The HOPE for Homeowners program will refinance borrowers who can’t afford their current mortgage but would be able to afford a new loan insured by the Federal Housing Administration.

3. Local Resources – Depending on the county that you live in, there are various groups and organizations that can help you save your home. There are a lot of groups such as Consumer Credit Counseling and Acorn that can be of assistance if you are facing foreclosure. All of these organizations have different programs available.
Worrying about losing your home can be very traumatic and at times, it can overtake your life. Take solace in knowing that there is assistance out there. You simply have to find it and begin the process.

what do when you are Underwater with your Mortgage

“Underwater” mortgages occur when a homeowner’s mortgage note balance is greater than the actual value of the home. Because the value of real property exceeded true market values as a result of loan saturation and real estate investment speculation, homeowner’s that took out first and second mortgages now find the value of the property to be less than the amount owing.

Mortgagees caught in this particular predicament may face rising mortgage payments due to ARM loans (Adjustable Rate Mortgages) and/or artificially high property taxes.
Ride out the real estate downturn:
Though underwater mortgagees may owe more than the property is worth that does not necessarily mean the borrower cannot afford the monthly mortgage payment. Mortgagees who are in this particular situation might attempt to ride the real estate downturn into recovery. Real property values have historically rebounded and if given enough time, borrowers may see a break-even point or an eventual appreciation greater than the mortgage balance.
Seek a loan modification:
Should an underwater borrower be unable to make mortgage payments in the near future, approaching the lender for options sooner rather than later is paramount. Lenders may offer short or long term forbearance agreements or a partial reinstatement. In any case of loan modification the borrower should know the fix is temporary and failure to meet any provision can negate the modification. Borrowers with FHA loans should consult HUD guidelines for federal loan modification plans and/or programs.
Rent the property out:
Another choice for underwater mortgage borrowers is to rent out the property and if necessary, cover the difference between the monthly rent and the mortgage payment. Homeowners should collect first and last month’s rent, along with a refundable security deposit.
Negotiate a short sale:
Borrowers that cannot wait out the real estate market or do not have the means to meet a forbearance plan and cannot meet or do not meet HUD guidelines, might elect to negotiate a short sale with the lender. In a short sale, the lender agrees to take a loss on the mortgage but may seek legal restitution even after the short sale has been approved and the property has sold.
File for bankruptcy:
Filing under Chapter 13 bankruptcy protection will allow the borrower to stay in the home but does not absolve the mortgage. Missed payments must be made up over the course of 60 months in addition to the regular mortgage payment.

Louisiana Government Mortgage Help

If you live in Louisiana and are having trouble paying your mortgage payments or are facing foreclosure, there may be help from you from the state government and others.
As soon as you know you will have trouble making your payment, you should call your lender. You will have more options if you are no more than one or two payments behind than you will later. A good lender will often be able to help you work through your financial problems and will not want to take your home away from you.

In Louisiana, it is possible to get mortgage help from your state government, national assistance programs, and state charities. You can receive help with bills, medical bills, health expenses, food assistance, and other items that will help you continue to be able to make your house payments.
Many state and local governments have assistance programs to help residents in paying or refinancing mortgages to stop or at least reduce foreclosures. The amount of help may vary from one state to another. It can include new mortgage loans; help with paying an existing mortgage, grants, mortgage counseling, and other help. You can also find help paying electric bills, and for child care.

On the website, http://www.hud.gov/local/la/renting/energyprgms.cfm  you can find out about programs to help you in any state, including, Louisiana. If there is not a specific program to help with your problem in your area of Louisiana, you might still get help with other things on the website, such as paying for your medical bills, help with your prescription drugs, charities that might provide financial assistance, community action agencies, which are public and private, and might offer financial assistance and counseling, and federal assistance programs.

Other Mortgage website also offers a link to programs in Louisiana to government programs that might help with mortgage payments. You might also receive assistance from a housing counselor in your area. A list of counselors recognized by the Federal Department of Housing and Urban Development can be found at hud.gov or by calling 1-800-569-4287.
If you need more help than the state might offer, or local charities, President Obama’s Mortgage Modification program might help you. Information can be found at the HUD website.

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