After a marathon session yesterday lasting into Friday’s early morning hours, the last details of a massive financial regulatory reform package were finalized in a conference committee between House and Senate members.
This sweeping reform legislation will drastically change the landscape of Wall Street and how the consumer is protected whenever credit is extended, including- but not limited to- mortgages, credit cards, payday lenders, and auto title loans. Virtually every business in the financial services and banking sectors are affected.
As previously reported by MHI over the past several weeks, both the House and Senate bills included provisions for the creation of a Consumer Financial Protection Agency (CFPA). The CFPA has been a central tenet of the Obama Administration’s efforts to ensure adequate consumer protections are in place for everything from credit cards to tax advisors. The new agency will focus enforcement of consumer protections contained in more than a dozen different laws and currently spread among various regulators.
Thus far, MHI has been successful in exempting industry salespersons and retailers from the scope of the new agency if they are 1) acting as an agent or broker for a buyer or seller of a manufactured home or a modular home or 2) facilitating the purchase by a consumer of a manufactured home or modular home, by negotiating the purchase price or terms of the sales contract. Our industry is one of just a few that have obtained this highly coveted exemption. If this provision continues to hold through final passage next week, and we expect it will, this is a significant victory for our industry.
The final bill approved by the conferees also moves jurisdiction of several laws over to the new agency, such as the Truth in Lending Act (TILA), RESPA, and others. The SAFE Act is one of many laws that will be transferred over to this new agency.
At this time, in consultation with several parties, including members of Congress, MHI is analyzing how the exclusion that industry is provided from the CFPA’s scope will impact this transfer of authority with regard to the SAFE Act.
Currently MHI believes that this will bolster our efforts to seek clarification, but does not believe that this news will solve the challenges created by the SAFE Act. Therefore, this news does not alter the industry’s efforts to seek clarity for retailers and salespersons that perform only administrative or clerical tasks, and to alleviate duplicative licensing for lenders who only originate personal property loans.
In addition, MHI is also not deterred from seeking passage of H.R. 5369 “Manufactured Housing Licensing Clarification Act of 2010.” The language in H.R. 5369 is intended to exempt activities which are administrative and clerical in nature that facilitate the sale of a home to a consumer such as assisting customers in completing paperwork. H.R. 5369 is an important step in bringing the influence of Congressional leadership into this critical industry issue and elevates awareness of the need for clarification and relief. The bill, in combination with over 5,000 comment letters submitted on the proposed rule to implement the SAFE Act, will assist MHI members and states in accomplishing the goal of allowing clerical and administrative tasks to be exempt activities under the SAFE Act.
MHI members can contact Thayer Long at tlong@mfghome.org.
