Notice2022-10772
Proposed Collection; Comment Request
Primary source
Metadata and text below are from the Federal Register, a public-domain U.S. government work. Always verify the official published version before relying on it for any legal matter.
Published
May 19, 2022
Issuing agencies
Federal Housing Finance Agency
Abstract
In accordance with the requirements of the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (PRA), the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) is seeking public comments concerning an information collection known as the "American Survey of Mortgage Borrowers (ASMB)," which has been assigned control number 2590-0015 by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). FHFA intends to submit the information collection to OMB for review and approval of a three-year reinstatement of the control number, which expired on March 31, 2021.
Full Text
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<title>Federal Register, Volume 87 Issue 97 (Thursday, May 19, 2022)</title>
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[Federal Register Volume 87, Number 97 (Thursday, May 19, 2022)]
[Notices]
[Pages 30480-30494]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2022-10772]
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FEDERAL HOUSING FINANCE AGENCY
[No. 2022-N-5]
Proposed Collection; Comment Request
AGENCY: Federal Housing Finance Agency.
ACTION: 30-Day notice of submission of information collection for
approval from the Office of Management and Budget.
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SUMMARY: In accordance with the requirements of the Paperwork Reduction
Act of 1995 (PRA), the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) is seeking
public comments concerning an information collection known as the
``American Survey of Mortgage Borrowers (ASMB),'' which has been
assigned control number 2590-0015 by the Office of Management and
Budget (OMB). FHFA intends to submit the information collection to OMB
for review and approval of a three-year reinstatement of the control
number, which expired on March 31, 2021.
DATES: Interested persons may submit comments on or before June 21,
2022.
ADDRESSES: Submit comments to the Office of Information and Regulatory
Affairs of the Office of Management and Budget, Attention: Desk Officer
for the Federal Housing Finance Agency, Washington, DC 20503, Fax:
(202) 395-3047, Email: <a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#5d12140f1c022e283f30342e2e3432331d32303f7338322d733a322b"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="07484e5546587472656a6e74746e686947686a652962687729606871">[email protected]</span></a>. Please also submit
comments to FHFA, identified by ``Proposed Collection; Comment Request:
`American Survey of Mortgage Borrowers, (No. 2022-N-5)' '' by any of
the following methods:
<bullet> Agency Website: <a href="http://www.fhfa.gov/open-for-comment-or-input">www.fhfa.gov/open-for-comment-or-input</a>.
<bullet> Federal eRulemaking Portal: <a href="http://www.regulations.gov">http://www.regulations.gov</a>.
Follow the instructions for submitting comments. If you submit your
comment to the Federal eRulemaking Portal, please also send it by email
to FHFA at <a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#faa89f9db99597979f948e89ba9c929c9bd49d958c"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="a1f3c4c6e2ceccccc4cfd5d2e1c7c9c7c08fc6ced7">[email protected]</span></a> to ensure timely receipt by the agency.
<bullet> Mail/Hand Delivery: Federal Housing Finance Agency, 400
Seventh Street SW, Washington, DC 20219, ATTENTION: Proposed
Collection; Comment Request: ``American Survey of Mortgage Borrowers,
(No. 2022-N-5).'' Please note that all mail sent to FHFA via U.S. Mail
is routed through a national irradiation facility, a process that may
delay delivery by approximately two weeks. For any time-sensitive
correspondence, please plan accordingly.
We will post all public comments we receive without change,
including any
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personal information you provide, such as your name and address, email
address, and telephone number, on the FHFA website at <a href="http://www.fhfa.gov">http://www.fhfa.gov</a>. In addition, copies of all comments received will be
available for examination by the public through the electronic comment
docket for this PRA Notice also located on the FHFA website.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Saty Patrabansh, Manager, National
Mortgage Database Program, <a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#4f1c2e3b36611f2e3b3d2e2d2e213c270f2927292e61282039"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="71221005085f211005031013101f021931171917105f161e07">[email protected]</span></a>, (202) 649-3213; or
Angela Supervielle, Counsel, <a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#33725d54565f521d6046435641455a565f5f5673555b55521d545c45"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="afeec1c8cac3ce81fcdadfcaddd9c6cac3c3caefc9c7c9ce81c8c0d9">[email protected]</span></a>, (202) 649-
3973, (these are not toll-free numbers), Federal Housing Finance
Agency, 400 Seventh Street SW, Washington, DC 20219. For TTY/TRS users
with hearing and speech disabilities, dial 711 and ask to be connected
to any of the contact numbers above.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
A. Background
The American Survey of Mortgage Borrowers (ASMB) is a component of
the ``National Mortgage Database'' (NMDB[supreg]) Program, which is a
joint effort of FHFA and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
(CFPB) (jointly, ``the agencies''). The NMDB Program is designed to
satisfy the Congressionally-mandated requirements of section 1324(c) of
the Federal Housing Enterprises Financial Safety and Soundness Act.\1\
Section 1324(c) requires that FHFA conduct a monthly survey to collect
data on the characteristics of individual prime and subprime mortgages,
and on the borrowers and properties associated with those mortgages, in
order to enable it to prepare a detailed annual report on the mortgage
market activities of the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie
Mae) and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac) for
review by the appropriate Congressional oversight committees. Section
1324(c) also authorizes and requires FHFA to compile a database of
otherwise unavailable residential mortgage market information and to
make that information available to the public in a timely fashion.
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\1\ 12 U.S.C. 4544(c).
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As a means of fulfilling those and other statutory requirements, as
well as to support policymaking and research regarding the residential
mortgage markets, FHFA and CFPB jointly established the NMDB Program in
2012. The Program is designed to provide comprehensive information
about the U.S. mortgage market and has three primary components: (1)
The NMDB; (2) the quarterly National Survey of Mortgage Originations
(NSMO); and (3) the ASMB.
The NMDB is a de-identified loan-level database of closed-end
first-lien residential mortgage loans that is representative of the
market as a whole, contains detailed loan-level information on the
terms and performance of the mortgages and the characteristics of the
associated borrowers and properties, is continually updated, has an
historical component dating back to 1998, and provides a sampling frame
for surveys to collect additional information. The core data in the
NMDB are drawn from a random 1-in-20 sample of all closed-end first-
lien mortgages outstanding at any time between January 1998 and the
present in the files of Experian, one of the three national credit
repositories, with a random sample of mortgages newly reported to
Experian added each quarter.
The NMDB draws additional information on mortgages in the NMDB
datasets from other existing sources, including Home Mortgage
Disclosure Act (HMDA) data that are maintained by the Federal Financial
Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC), property valuation models,
and administrative data files maintained by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
and by federal agencies. FHFA also obtains data from the two surveys
conducted as part of the program--the NSMO and the ASMB.
The NSMO is a quarterly survey that provides critical and timely
information on newly-originated mortgages and associated borrowers that
are not available from other sources, including: The range of
nontraditional and subprime mortgage products being offered, the
methods by which these mortgages are being marketed, and the
characteristics of borrowers for these types of loans.\2\
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\2\ OMB has cleared the NSMO under the PRA and assigned it
control no. 2590-0012, which expires on June 30, 2023.
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While the NSMO provides information on newly-originated mortgages,
the ASMB focuses on borrowers' experience with maintaining their
existing mortgages. This includes their experience maintaining
mortgages under financial stress, their experience in soliciting
financial assistance, their success in accessing federally sponsored
programs designed to assist them, and, where applicable, any challenges
they may have had in terminating a mortgage loan. The ASMB is designed
to collect information necessary to allow empirical analysis of two
questions of vital importance to residential mortgage market
policymakers and stakeholders: (1) What factors explain or predict
which borrowers will become delinquent on their mortgages; and (2) once
a borrower becomes delinquent, what factors explain or predict whether
the borrower will (a) become current on the loan, (b) decide they
cannot afford the mortgage and sell the property or modify the
mortgage, or (c) remain delinquent and enter into foreclosure.
From 2016 through 2018, the ASMB questionnaire was sent once
annually to a stratified random sample of 10,000 borrowers with
mortgages in the NMDB. FHFA did not undertake the ASMB during 2019, but
sent the survey again in the fall of 2020 with a specific focus on the
experiences of borrowers during the COVID-19 pandemic using a
stratified random sample of 10,000 borrowers. The 2020 survey was
substantially similar to the 2018 survey, except it included a number
of questions specifically relating to the COVID-19 pandemic and its
effects. In 2020, the ASMB had a 21 percent overall response rate,
which yielded 2,100 survey responses. The 2022 survey is similar to the
2020 survey in its focus on how the pandemic impacted borrowers and
extends the focus to the experiences of those who used forbearance.
Seven completely new questions have been added regarding expanded
mortgage payment forbearance options and borrowers' overall financial
health. Additionally, four questions were added which were not in the
2020 ASMB, but were in either the 2018 ASMB or the current NSMO
questionnaire. The remaining questions existed in the 2020
questionnaire, although some have been revised to address issues
leaving forbearance rather than issues entering it. Because of the
elimination of several questions, as well as the combination of some
other questions, the total number of questions has decreased from 92 on
the 2020 survey questionnaire to 86 on the 2022 questionnaire.
Each of the 86 questions on the 2022 ASMB survey questionnaire is
designed to elicit one or more of five different categories of
information that are not available in the administrative data and that
are needed either to properly analyze the issues described above or
information is needed to validate the survey responses. These
categories are: (1) Information needed to validate that the survey
reached the correct borrower and that the borrower is providing answers
about the correct loan; (2) information about the mortgage loan that
does not exist in sufficient detail in the administrative data; (3)
information about the borrower's economic
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circumstances that does not exist, or exists in insufficient detail, in
the administrative data; (4) information about the borrower's attitudes
regarding their mortgage, property, interactions with lenders and
servicers, and life circumstances; and (5) information needed to
determine the ultimate outcome of the borrower's forbearance or
delinquency and the interim steps that led to that outcome.
B. Need for and Use of the Information Collection
FHFA views the NMDB Program as a whole, including the ASMB, as the
monthly ``survey'' required by section 1324(c) of the Safety and
Soundness Act. Core inputs to the NMDB, such as a regular refresh of
the credit repository data, occur monthly, though the actual surveys
conducted under the NMDB Program do not. The information collected
through the ASMB is used, in combination with information obtained from
existing sources in the NMDB, to assist FHFA in understanding how the
performance of existing mortgages is influencing the residential
mortgage market, what borrower groups are discussing with their
servicers when they are under financial stress, and consumers' opinions
of federally-sponsored programs designed to assist them. This
important, but otherwise unavailable, information assists FHFA in the
supervision of its regulated entities (Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and the
Federal Home Loan Banks) and in the development and implementation of
appropriate and effective policies and programs. The information may
also be used for research and analysis by CFPB and other federal
agencies that have regulatory and supervisory responsibilities and
mandates related to mortgage markets and to provide a resource for
research and analysis by academics and other interested parties outside
of the government.
As discussed above, the agencies have added to the 2022 ASMB survey
questionnaire several questions relating to the effect of the COVID-19
pandemic on home mortgage borrowers. The CARES Act of 2020 \3\ allowed
a forbearance for mortgage borrowers impacted by the pandemic so they
could pause or delay their mortgage payments. FHFA and CFPB are
actively engaged in monitoring the outcomes of these borrowers and the
effects of this policy on the residential mortgage market. As borrowers
exit their forbearance periods, it is critical for both agencies to
have timely access to this information to assist in evidenced-based
policymaking in these areas.
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\3\ Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, Public
Law 116-136 (2020).
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FHFA is also seeking OMB approval to continue to conduct cognitive
pre-testing of the survey materials. The Agency uses information
collected through that process to assist in drafting and modifying the
survey questions and instructions, as well as the related
communications, to read in the way that will be most readily understood
by the survey respondents and that will be most likely to elicit usable
responses. Such information is also used to help the Agency decide on
how best to organize and format the survey questionnaires.
C. Burden Estimate
This information collection comprises two components: (1) The ASMB
survey; and (2) the pre-testing of the survey questionnaire and related
materials through the use of cognitive testing. FHFA conducted the
survey annually from 2016 through 2018, but did not conduct the survey
in 2019 nor 2021. FHFA assumes that it will conduct the survey once
annually over the next three years and that it will conduct two rounds
of pre-testing on each year of survey materials.
FHFA has analyzed the total hour burden on members of the public
associated with conducting the survey (4,200 hours) and with pre-
testing the survey materials (24 hours) and estimates the total annual
hour burden imposed on the public by this information collection to be
4,224 hours. The estimate for each phase of the collection was
calculated as follows:
I. Conducting the Survey
FHFA estimates that the ASMB questionnaire will be sent to 10,000
recipients each time it is conducted. Although it expects that only
about 2,100 of those surveys will be returned, FHFA has calculated the
burden estimates below as if all of the surveys will be returned. Based
on the reported experience of respondents to earlier ASMB
questionnaires, FHFA estimates that it will take each respondent 25
minutes to complete each survey, including the gathering of necessary
materials to respond to the questions. This results in a total annual
burden estimate of 4,200 hours for the survey phase of this collection
(1 survey per year x 10,000 respondents per survey x 25 minutes per
respondent = 4,200 hours).
II. Pre-Testing the Materials
FHFA estimates that it will sponsor 2 rounds of 12 cognitive
interviews prior to conducting each annual survey for a total of 24
cognitive interview participants. It estimates the participation time
for each cognitive interview participant to be one hour, resulting in a
total annual burden estimate of 24 hours for the pre-testing phase of
the collection.
D. Comment Request
In accordance with the requirements of 5 CFR 1320.8(d), FHFA
published an initial notice and request for public comments regarding
this information collection in the Federal Register on December 28,
2021.\4\ The 60-day comment period closed on February 28, 2022. FHFA
received no comments.
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\4\ See 86 FR 73770 (Dec. 28, 2021).
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FHFA requests written comments on the following: (1) Whether the
collection of information is necessary for the proper performance of
FHFA functions, including whether the information has practical
utility; (2) the accuracy of FHFA's estimates of the burdens of the
collection of information; (3) ways to enhance the quality, utility,
and clarity of the information collected; and (4) ways to minimize the
burden of the collection of information on respondents, including
through the use of automated collection techniques or other forms of
information technology.
Shawn Bucholtz,
Chief Data Officer, Federal Housing Finance Agency.
BILLING CODE 8070-01-P
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[FR Doc. 2022-10772 Filed 5-18-22; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 8070-01-C
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