July 19, 2005

Mindy Carr
Director of Government Affairs

HUD holds first RESPA roundtable meeting

The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) held the first of three roundtable meetings on July 14 in Washington D.C. to discuss RESPA reform issues. As reported in the June 30 Dateline Austin, TLTA has been invited to participate at the July 28 meeting. Attending on behalf of TLTA, will be President Bruce Liesman and D.C. Lobbyist Jim Hyland.

We learned from the July 14 meeting that HUD outlined four goals for RESPA reform: simplicity, clarity, transparency and greater certainty of closing costs. They also discussed two new HUD forms: Mortgage Package Offer (MPO) and a revised Good Faith Estimate (GFE). These are DRAFT forms that reflect HUD's position on The Good Faith Estimate and The Mortgage Package Offer in 2004. These forms do not necessarily indicate the Department's current thinking and are provided to stimulate a dialogue among those consumer and industry organizations with an interest in RESPA reform. A large part of the discussion focused on the “more” controversial issues initiated by the 2004 proposed rule: yield spread premium disclosures, packaging and the Section 8(a) exemption.

For more information, go to HUD’s website at http://www.hud.gov/respareform/index.cfm

Read the 2005 Legislative Report

Over 1300 bills became law when the 79^th Legislative Session ended on May 30^th. The Texas Land Title Association lobby team tracked over 500 bills during the session on issues affecting the title insurance industry. There were a number of bills that passed that could impact the way you do business.

Our Lobby Team spent a majority of its time playing defense against bills that would have adversely affected the title insurance industry. Overall we experienced a successful legislative session and escaped relatively "unscathed." The 2005 Legislative Report includes a brief explanation of all the bills that were tracked by the TLTA Lobby Team, with a notation if the bill passed or not and its effective date.

Click here to read the 2005 Legislative Report.