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Financial institution regulators, including the NCUA, have issued a joint policy statement to provide regulatory flexibility to mortgage lenders and enable them to work with customers who may be struggling due to the coronavirus emergency.

The statement allows mortgage lenders to place consumers in short-term payment forbearance programs such as the one required by the CARES Act. In the CARES Act program, borrowers may make a forbearance request to their mortgage lender and affirm that they are experiencing a financial hardship during the coronavirus crisis, and in response mortgage lenders must provide a CARES Act forbearance that allows borrowers to defer their mortgage payments up to 180 days.

Additionally, the interagency statement clarifies that the signed agencies do not intend to take action against lenders for any delays in sending certain early intervention and loss mitigation notices or annual escrow statements, or taking certain actions relating to loss mitigation set out in the mortgage servicing rules, provided that lenders are “making good faith efforts to provide these notices and take these actions within a reasonable time.”

The statement was released by the NCUA, CFPB, Federal Reserve Board, FDIC, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and Conference of State Bank Supervisors.

In a letter sent to the Federal Housing Finance Agency last week, NAFCU President and CEO Dan Berger noted the effect that forbearance payments may have on credit unions over the next few months.

For more on helping borrowers, several recent NAFCU Compliance Blog posts offer further information on open-end and closed-end credit, forbearance agreements and credit reporting under the CARES Act. The association’s Compliance Team is publishing new blog posts daily, Monday-Friday, to keep credit unions informed of important regulatory updates during the coronavirus pandemic. Read more from the Compliance Blog here; access all NAFCU's coronavirus resources here.