Press Releases
May 14, 2009
We applaud President Obama for his leadership in pushing for reforms of credit card industry practices that unfairly strip billions of dollars from America's families each year.
As organizations representing consumers, civil rights groups, small businesses and labor, we urge swift passage of the Credit CARD Act, a bill championed by Sen. Chris Dodd and Sen. Richard Shelby that enjoys broad, bipartisan support.
At today's town hall meeting in New Mexico, the president underscored his belief that strong consumer protections are essential to a sound economy, a lesson we've all learned the...
May 8, 2009
We took a quick sampling of credit card issuers' recent activities to see how they have responded to the Federal Reserve rule changes that were announced in December 2008 but won't take effect until July 2010. We found the top eight issuers, who account for 80 percent of credit card balances, are raising interest rates on a larger portion of customers than usual and increasing the number of fees they impose. The new Fed rule will ban some but not all of these activities.
Perhaps most notable is what these issuers—Citigroup, Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Capital One, HSBC, Discover,...
May 7, 2009
"We commend the House of Representatives and the House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank, along with lead sponsors, Reps. Mel Watt and Brad Miller, on the passage of H.R. 1728, the Mortgage Reform and Anti-Predatory Lending Act. At its core, this legislation provides that mortgage lenders may only make mortgages that a consumer can afford to repay. While that might seem like basic common sense, today's mortgage crisis was caused by lenders making and refinancing loans with the sole goal of short-term gain rather than long-term sustainability.
"H.R. 1728 includes many...
May 5, 2009
"Jack Kemp had many accomplishments: NFL quarterback, member of Congress, secretary of HUD, Republican vice presidential nominee. Driving his public service was an unwavering belief that each and every person deserves a chance to succeed. He was a longtime civil rights advocate and champion of home ownership, most recently fighting an uphill battle for policies that would help millions of financially stressed families avoid foreclosure and stay in their homes. He helped move the ball forward. We will miss him."
For more information: Kathleen Day at (202) 349-1871 or kathleen.day@...
April 30, 2009
The Senate today voted down the one common-sense solution that would have prevented over a million families from losing their homes to foreclosure ? allowing bankruptcy judges to modify home loans to fair market terms. This measure would have encouraged mortgage servicers to voluntarily restructure mortgages to make them affordable in much greater numbers, saving up to 1.7 million families from foreclosure. It also would have saved their neighbors from losing an additional $300 billion in reduced property values caused by these preventable foreclosures.
The banking industry, after...
April 30, 2009
We commend the U.S. House of Representatives for taking this important step toward ending credit card industry practices that Americans across the board find unfair. Interest rates and fees should be transparent, reasonably related to risk and presented to cardholders up-front. And credit card companies should not be allowed to arbitrarily change them, especially retroactively. Today's bipartisan vote is encouraging, and we hope the Senate will act quickly to pass similar legislation now before it. Reforming credit card lending practices is long overdue. Making those reforms effective as...
April 9, 2009
The federal debate on payday lending practices is heating up. A bill in the House, H.R. 1214, features measures intended to reform abusive payday lending but that have failed at the state level to curb loan flipping practices that trap the financially vulnerable. By contrast, Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin (S. 500) and California Rep. Jackie Speier (H.R. 1608) have introduced common-sense bills that would restore consumer protections by placing a 36 percent annual interest-rate cap on consumer loans. The Center for Responsible Lending supports S. 500 and H.R. 1608.
CRL's research shows that...
April 2, 2009
"Today the House Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit Subcommittee will hold a hearing on H.R. 1214, the Payday Loan Reform Act.
We commend Representative Luis Gutierrez (D-IL), who chairs this Subcommittee and introduced the bill, for his long history of working for economic fairness and financial reform and his interest in addressing payday lending, a practice that frustrates the efforts of low-income families to recover from a cash shortfall and get back on firm financial ground.
We continue to oppose the provisions of HR 1214 because they do not address the fundamental problems...
March 30, 2009
A CRL survey published today finds high levels of support for an annual interest rate cap on consumer loans of no higher than 36 percent. Three out of four Americans with an opinion think that Congress should cap interest rates at some level, and 72 percent think that level should be no higher than 36 percent.
http://qa.crl.w.lmdagency.net/research-publication/interest-rate-survey
Such a cap has been introduced in both the U.S. Senate and House as one strategy for helping to restore the health of our economy and financial systems. Senator Dick Durbin, (D-IL) introduced S500 in late...
March 26, 2009
Payday stores concentrate in African-American, Latino neighborhoods
Race, ethnicity leading factor in determining payday lender location, but not banks'
Payday lenders are nearly eight times more concentrated in California's African-American and Latino neighborhoods as compared to white neighborhoods, draining these communities of $247 million in payday loan fees according to new research from the Center for Responsible Lending (CRL). A disparity remains even after accounting for factors like income, poverty rates and education.
Federal legislation could address problems with...