Bills to Help Cardholders and Help Reduce Foreclosed Homes
May 4th, 2009 by 
Joseph Smith
As times get more financially difficult for many Americans because of mass layoffs and foreclosure homes, the Senate and the House passed separate bills aimed at helping consumers manage their credit card debts and helping homeowners protect themselves from mortgage fraud.
On Thursday, the House easily passed the Credit Cardholders’ Bill of Rights that would protect credit cardholders from sudden interest rate increases, hidden charges and excessive fees. A number of mortgage borrowers whose homes are in danger of becoming foreclosed homes can have more leeway if they are also helped with their credit card debts.
The House legislators passed the bill despite strong opposition from the banking industry, which argued that the bill would cut the amount of available credit and would increase the cost of completing credit card transactions.
Nearly 77 percent of the country’s credit card market in 2007 was controlled by major banks, including Bank of America, Citigroup, J.P. Morgan Chase and Capital One Financial Corp.
President Obama is expected to approve the Senate version of the bill after senators discuss the bill next week. Obama has been campaigning for and supporting legislative efforts to revamp the financial industry, including initiatives that compel the financial sector to help cut down the number of foreclosed homes nationwide.
In a White House meeting with the top executives of the country’s largest credit card issuers, President Obama stated that credit cards are important for consumers and are their major source of convenient credit. He said the credit card sector should be preserved in ways that eliminate abuses.
During his campaign last year, the president advocated for a bill of rights for credit cardholders, in addition to his call for immediate solutions to large numbers of foreclosed homes battering communities nationwide.
Meanwhile, in the Senate, legislators also approved by an overwhelming vote of 92 to 4 a bill that would allot $490 million to fight mortgage loan fraud and other types of deception related to housing and foreclosed homes. The money would be spent to hire more fraud prosecutors, government investigators and law enforcement personnel.
The legislation would distribute the funding among the Secret Service, the Housing and Urban Development and the Postal Inspection Service.
Included in the bill is a provision that would set up two independent commissions that will investigate the causes of the economic crisis and the collapse of the housing and mortgage sectors that led to the avalanche of foreclosed homes across the country.
