Skip to footer

HARP loan extended through 2017, offering relief to underwater homeowners

The FHFA estimates that over 300,000 homeowners who owe more than their home is worth could still refinance through the Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP) to lower their monthly payments and avoid foreclosure.

|
John Raoux/AP/File
Nicole Caverly stands in front of her home in the Piedmont Park neighborhood in Apopka, Fla. Caverly began renting in the Piedmont Park neighborhood this year. The previous owners lost the three-bedroom house to foreclosure in 2015.

U.S. homeowners who are struggling to make their monthly mortgage payments have more time to take advantage of a government refinance program. The Federal Housing Finance Agency has extended the Home Affordable Refinance Program, or HARP loan, through Sept. 30, 2017.

The FHFA estimates that over 300,000 U.S. homeowners whose mortgages are underwater — they owe more than their home is worth — could still refinance through HARP to lower their monthly payments and avoid foreclosure.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will offer a new refinance program for borrowers with high loan-to-value ratios beginning October 2017, according to the FHFA. Meanwhile, the HARP loan, which was set to expire at the end of 2016, will “create a bridge” to the new refinance program, the agency said in a news release.

The FHFA says that “the new refinance offering will provide much-needed liquidity for borrowers who are current on their mortgage, but are unable to refinance through traditional programs.”

Over 3.4 million homeowners have used HARP to refinance their mortgages since 2009, when the program was launched in response to the housing crisis, according to the FHFA.

Deborah Kearns is a staff writer at NerdWallet, a personal finance website. Email:dkearns@nerdwallet.com. Twitter: @debbie_kearns.

The article HARP Loan Extended Through September 2017 originally appeared on NerdWallet.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to HARP loan extended through 2017, offering relief to underwater homeowners
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/Saving-Money/2016/0827/HARP-loan-extended-through-2017-offering-relief-to-underwater-homeowners
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe