February 16th, 2012

HUD Secretary Donovan: mandatory mortgage deal is just one tool

CNN anchor Soledad O’brien’s sits down with HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan in an exclusive interview on a new sweeping mortgage settlement program.

Donovan says, “One of the things that’s critical about this is that [the settlement is] mandatory. This isn’t a voluntary program. These aren’t incentives. The banks have to do this and if they don’t, there are huge financial penalties to them and because it’s part of enforcement, it’s registered in the court and we can go back into court and really force them to do this.”

He adds, “The settlement is only one piece of a series of things we’ve announced over the last few weeks. Universal refinancing, unemployed homeowners can get more help than they were able to get before, a homeowner bill of rights. All of these fit together. The settlement alone isn’t going to fix the whole housing crisis. We never said it would. We need all of these pieces to come together.”

Starting Point with Soledad O’Brien airs week mornings from 7-9am ET on CNN.