"We will crack down on mortgage professionals found guilty of fraud by increasing enforcement and creating new criminal penalties."
During the campaign, Barack Obama promised increased enforcement for mortgage fraud. The Fraud Enforcement and Recovery Act updated definitions in federal antifraud statutes to include mortgage lenders who are not directly regulated or insured by the federal government. Obama signed the law May 20, 2009.
The law also makes it a federal crime to make a materially false statement on a mortgage application or to willfully overvalue a property to influence any action by a mortgage lending business. Previously, the law only applied to institutions directly regulated by the federal government.
We rate this Promise Kept.