The rise of delinquencies and foreclosures in a softening housing market calls for systematic studies of default behavior and efforts to minimize the default risks. Using a sample of residential mortgages made to low- to moderate-income borrowers, this paper empirically examines the impact of a...

In this working paper, Quercia, McCarthy, and Stegman use dataobtained on 874 low income, rural borrowers participating in the Section 502 Home Ownership program administered by the Farmer's Home Administration (FmHA), and apply two multivariate proportional hazard models in order to analyze...

By the end of 2007, thirty states and the District of Colombia had passed some sort of mortgage regulation statute, while the remaining states left the mortgage market unregulated. Were these state mortgage laws effective in restraining risky mortgage lending and mitigating the surge in...

Utilizing a unique sample of community reinvestment loans, we study the propensity of very low income households to default or prepay on a mortgage and compare it to the outcomes for low income and moderate income households. The results indicate that, even within moderate and low income...

This article uses a unique demonstration program to examine the interaction of CRA-related lending with subprime and FHA lending activity. Specifically, the empirical analysis identifies the extent to which the origination of a CRA mortgage substitutes for FHA and subprime originations during...

The substantial costs of foreclosures to individuals and society motivated nearly $40 billion in government subsidies to homeowners during the Great Recession. Most of these subsidies were in the form of permanent loan modifications with mixed evidence of effectiveness. This paper estimates the...

The topic of neighborhood redevelopment is central to the field residential appraisal and the lending process. We examine both the effect of neighborhood upgrading and decline, captured by subsidized new residential construction and sustained property tax delinquency respectively, on the sales...

We examine the personal bankruptcy decisions of lower-income homeowners before and after the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act (BAPCPA). Econometric studies suggest that personal bankruptcy is explained by financial gain rather than adverse events, but data constraints have...

There is limited evidence of the role of household-level adverse trigger events in driving mortgage default, and the evidence based on proxies, such as the unemployment rate, is inconsistent. Using a survey of low- and moderate-income homeowners with community reinvestment mortgages, we study...

As part of President Barack Obama's Climate Action Plan, the Obama administration recently proposed that energy efficiency should be factored into mortgage underwriting upon the sale or refinancing of new and existing homes. Little empirical evidence unfortunately exists on the relationship...