If you are waiting for government help to stop foreclosure, you will need to wait until President Elect Obama and the new congress is seated before you have any financial difficulty. That’s because the existing program, Hope for Homeowners (H4H) is great for the government but not so good for anybody else. When the initial plan was unveiled by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) the anticipation was that it would help to save over 400,000 homeowners from foreclosure. H4H went live on October 1st, 2008 and in the first two months relatively few homeowners have taken advantage of it. There will be many articles touting it as a great thing that will help many people. To me, it is a fairly stupid idea.
H4H requires lenders to take a serious haircut and for borrowers to give up their equity. At first look, it seems like a good idea. Under further investigation I think it falls apart. Let’s take a look at how the FHA describes this will work. For purposes of discussion, we will presume that you paid $250,000 for the house with a 10% down payment. The example information below is taken directly from the FHA website.
These are examples of how the unique equity and appreciation sharing elements of this program work. Keep in mind that these are only examples, and your actual experience will depend on many things, including how much your home increases or decreases in value1