Fannie Mae Abandons Variable Down Payment for Declining Markets Policy.

Readers may recall earlier posts HERE and HERE discussing Fannie Mae's declining markets policies that in my view could have been seen as a new form of redlining.

Fannie Mae has now announced HERE that they will be no longer be using variable down payment levels for declining markets.

A Bloomberg News story HERE confirms that I was not the only observer who had raised the issue of potential redlining.

"Housing advocates such as the Oak Park Regional Housing Center in suburban Chicago complained that by basing requirements for 5 percent larger down payments on the state of housing markets in certain zip codes, rather than broader metropolitan areas, Fannie Mae was in engaging a type of discrimination called redlining."