The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau started the process to get industry feedback on the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act (RESPA) mortgage servicing rule as required under Dodd-Frank.
“This rule gave borrowers new consumer protections related to mortgage loan servicing, many of which were aimed at helping consumers who were having trouble making their mortgage payments,” the bureau stated.
The official request asks the public to comment on the CFPB’s plan, to suggest sources of data and generally to provide other information that would help with the assessment.
Under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, the CFPB must review some of its rules within five years after they take effect.
These formal reviews are called assessments and will address the rule’s effectiveness in meeting the purposes and objectives of Dodd-Frank Act and the specific goals of the rule.
However, the bureau only recently finished the final mortgage servicing rule, which is slated to go into effect on Oct. 19, 2017. The final rule clarified and revised the 2013 RESPA Servicing Final Rule and the 2013 TILA Servicing Final Rule.
But in its request for comment on the rule, the CFPB explained that it determined the 2013 TILA Servicing Final Rule is not a significant enough rule to fall under the Dodd-Frank assessment requirement.
“Therefore, the Bureau is not seeking comment on the 2013 TILA Servicing Final Rule or its related subsequent amendments in this notice,” the request stated.
The CFPB is working in advance of its five-year deadline since the CFPB issued the 2013 RESPA Servicing Final Rule back in January 2013, so its report will not be issued until January 2019. Comments on the plan will be due 60 days after it is published in the Federal Register.
Back in March, Chris D’Angelo, associate director of the CFPB’s Division of Supervision, Enforcement and Fair Lending, actually noted at an event that the CFPB was starting the process of assessing its major mortgage rules, as Pavitra Bacon covered in a blog on the CFPB Monitor.
In doing so, D’Angelo said the CFPB would assess its mortgage rules to see how they are impacting the market, along with if they are fulfilling their purpose. He also noted the bureau would check to see if there’s some tailoring needed to make rules more effective.
