Dodd sides with Bush, screws minorities on housing

Presidential hopeful Chris Dodd, Chairman of Banking, Housing & Urban Affairs Committee, is making the remarkable move of closing down a Federal program that has historically helped hundreds of thousands of disadvantaged groups and the poor achieve first time homeownership.

Dodd is siding with Senate Republicans (like Senator Richard Shelby, R-AL no less) to give a slap in the face to minorities across the country. Dodd is supporting Bush's HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson in his move to eliminate downpayment assistance programs. According to the GAO, the move to get rid of downpayment assistance programs will bar approximately 40% of African-American homebuyers from utilizing Federal Housing Administration insured loans. Also affected are potentially 30% of Latinos.

While I appreciate the work Senator Dodd has done in regards to working to restore habeas corpus rights and stopping telecom companies from having complete amnesty for their crimes...right needs to be told he will lose all effective support he has from the blogosphere if this program is shut down! What Senator Dodd is doing will screw the poor, minorities, and many single parent mothers from ever owning a home. True progressives Rep. Maxine Waters and Rep. Barney Frank have showed their leadership in securing a bill in the House to protect this program. In the Senate, Senator Dodd holds the keys. Sign this petition (http://www.gopetition.com/online/14912.html) and call Senator Dodd now. For more information on this issue, see below.

Here's the lowdown. Downpayment assistance programs allow nonprofits to assist home buyers in providing the minimum down payment required for Federal Housing Authority (FHA) loans. Shutting down this program will effectively destroy the nonprofits seeking to help first time home buyers achieve their dreams of home ownership. From 2000 through 2006, more than 650,000 buyers got their down payments through nonprofits. HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson believes with the recent foreclosures occurring because of subprime loans, an increased number of borrowers will seek downpayment assistance and place enormous fiscal stress on the FHA. However, Secretary Jackson is overlooking the fact that if downpayment assistance programs are shut out, even more borrowers will be FORCED into predatory loan agreements and subprime loans. The reality is, downpayment assistance programs are needed more than ever now, and to remove the program is to put families onto the street and to keep an entire segment of the population continually renting from landlords.

Write or Call Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee Chairman Chris Dodd to tell him:

"Please do not shut down the downpayment assistance program. This program helps hundreds of thousands of disadvantaged families across the country achieve the American dream of homeownership."

Banking Committee Contact:
534 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510
P: (202) 224-7391
F: (202) 224-5137

U.S. Senator Chris Dodd Contact:
448 Russell Building | Washington D.C., 20510
Tel: (202) 224-2823 | Fax: (202) 224-1083

I wonder *if* he did it.

Realtors set them up, then they jack up the price of the house, and the seller puts the excess back into the "downpayment fund". It's part of the reason housing has gone up. Low income get sucked into the interest only loans on housing prices higher than they would have been. When the interest resets, they lose their home and the realtor does it all over again.