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Washington, D.C. – Alaskan Congressman Don Young voted this afternoon in favor of S. 896, the Helping Families Save Their Homes Act of 2009.  This bill increases the number of loans refinanced through the Hope for Homeowners program, a program which authorizes $300 billion of Federal Housing Administration loan guarantees and is intended to help homeowners work out their mortgages and ultimately stay in their homes. 

“This bill increases the borrowing authority for both the FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation) and NCUA (National Credit Union Administration) which will result in $75 billion worth of additional lending to communities; this makes it beneficial to many Alaskans,” said Rep. Young.  “In addition, this legislation is heavily supported by the Alaskan Veterans because of its inclusion of the HEARTH Act, which reauthorizes the McKinney-Vento Homeless program and creates permanent supportive housing for families and individuals who are homeless and disabled.   

“The most important thing about this bill is that it did not include the ‘cram-down’ provision from the original House bill.  That ‘cram-down’ portion would have made it more costly for other individuals to purchase homes because lenders would have had to increase interest rates and down payments on other mortgage holders to supplement losses.  This would result in a tightening of mortgage credit which has accounted for a large portion of our current economic crisis. 

“The original bill was trying to solve a crisis by possibly handing us a whole new crisis; it didn’t make sense.  This bill makes sense, and is one I can support.”

This bill passed by a vote of 367-54.      

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