MBA Releases 'Affordability in Action' Roadmap Urging Cuts to Credit, Pricing and FHA Insurance Costs

The Mortgage Bankers Association released a policy paper on Wednesday, Oct. 14, at its Annual Convention and Expo in Chicago titled Affordability in Action: A Policy Roadmap to Lower the Cost of Financing a Home to Own or Rent. The trade group describes it as a set of near-term administrative and regulatory recommendations.

Why this matters: These are proposals from the lending industry's main trade group. None has been adopted by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, the FHA or any regulator, and borrowers should not expect lower costs from this paper alone. It does show which changes lenders will press for in Washington.

Graphic: The five areas named in MBA's Oct. 14 release. Graphic by mortgage.news using only the text of the cited release.

Lower the cost of the mortgage itself

MBA calls for replacing the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac requirement to pull a credit report from all three bureaus for lower-risk borrowers, reducing and aligning the companies' loan-level price adjustments for home purchases, and lowering FHA annual mortgage insurance premiums. It also asks for wider use of automated valuation models and AI-assisted underwriting, and for lower title insurance costs.

MBA estimates that a 20-basis-point cut in the FHA annual premium would save a borrower with a $400,000 loan nearly $800 a year. That is MBA's own calculation of a hypothetical change, not a current FHA policy.

More access to credit

The paper asks regulators to modernize loan officer compensation rules so lenders can match or beat a competitor's offer, create a streamlined refinance option for qualified Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac borrowers, simplify disclosure rules under TILA and RESPA, finalize a more flexible VA Interest Rate Reduction Refinance Loan framework, and align underwriting standards for manufactured and veteran housing.

Rental housing and supply

For renters, MBA recommends making the companies' multifamily programs more effective and reducing costs and paperwork in FHA multifamily and healthcare lending. On supply, it calls for more condominium and new-construction financing, a modernized FHA 203(k) rehabilitation program, Davis-Bacon wage rules tailored to federal housing programs and support for state and local building incentives. MBA also says it opposes rent-control mandates and extended eviction moratoriums, positions tenant advocates often dispute.

The long-run system

The final section asks for bank capital requirements that are right-sized for mortgage risk and for a revived private-label mortgage securities market.

What MBA's leaders said

MBA President and CEO Bob Broeksmit said the paper lays out focused steps policymakers can take now. Owen Lee, MBA's 2027 chairman and chief executive of Success Mortgage Partners, said the goal is to strip away costs that show up in a higher mortgage rate, closing costs or rent. MBA said the recommendations are not looser credit or lower building standards.

What to watch

Several items, such as the tri-merge credit report and price adjustments, are decisions for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and their regulator. Others would need HUD, VA or banking-agency action. MBA has posted a roadmap page for the full paper. Any change that is adopted would come through those agencies' own announcements, with their own effective dates.

The takeaway: Treat the roadmap as a list of industry requests. Until an agency acts, today's credit report, pricing and insurance costs still apply to every loan.