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CFPB Director Richard Cordray told lawmakers this week that the bureau will, in the next two weeks, propose a Home Mortgage Disclosure Act rule change to give some issuers of mortgage credit, including credit unions, limited, temporary relief in the reporting of home equity lines of credit.

Cordray was writing in response to a NAFCU-sought letter from Sens. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., and Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D., who wrote him last month urging the CFPB to delay or modify the HMDA rule. The senators sent their letter after introducing a NAFCU-backed bill to both raise the loan threshold for HMDA reporters and delay implementation of the CFPB's 2015-revised HMDA rule by one year.

Under their bill, titled the Home Mortgage Disclosure Adjustment Act, depository institutions that have originated fewer than 500 open-end lines of credit and closed-end mortgages in each of the previous two years would be exempt from HMDA reporting and recordkeeping requirements.

Cordray's proposal would raise the reporting threshold to 500 only for HELOCs and would be effective only for 2018 and 2019. Cordray said the proposal would give small institutions added relief while providing the bureau "ample opportunity" to reconsider the HELOC threshold in the final rule and decide where to set it for 2020.

In general, the CFPB's final HMDA rule changes are set to take effect Jan. 1, 2018, with most data submissions under the new provisions due in 2019. The rule changes affect HELOCs, establish transactional thresholds for coverage and expand the number of HMDA data points to be collected from credit unions.

NAFCU President and CEO Dan Berger urged Cordray in May to delay the rule's effective date to Jan. 1, 2019.