CRL in the News

In the waning days of the Obama administration, Deutsche Bank made a series of unusually frank admissions in a U.S. court filing. The German bank acknowledged that during the housing boom it made intentionally false representations to buyers of its mortgage-backed securities, concealing the actual risks from purchasers of the bonds. It lied, for example, about borrowers’ credit scores. It...

WASHINGTON, D.C. — (RealEstateRama) — The Senate confirmed Mark Calabria as the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) –the federal regulator that oversees Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac – led by acting director Joseph Otting since early January. Calabria, who has served as chief economist for Vice President Mike Pence, was nominated to head the FHFA by the...

College-sponsored bank accounts ding students with millions of dollars in fees each year, according to a report by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The Education Department under President Donald Trump never published the analysis but advocacy groups recently obtained it through a Freedom of Information Act request. The bureau reviewed 573 colleges across the country with marketing agreements with banks...

Stephen Marley comes from music royalty. Sean Garrett has written and produced smash hits for Beyoncé, Usher and Ciara. Even so, when they and hundreds of lesser-known names in the world of hip-hop and rap needed cash, one Wall Street figure emerged as an unlikely source behind the financing: hedge-fund titan Jamie Dinan. In a few short years, Sound Royalties...

They are pricey, pesky and often designed to catch you off guard when you can least afford them. Checking and savings account fees can add to the cost of closing a bank account or force a low account balance into the negatives. So what bank fees should you be looking out for? And how can you avoid them if your...

As the Brookings report authors — Robin Howarth and Lisa Stifler of the nonprofit Center for Responsible Lending — note, a 1998 change to the Higher Education Act opened the door to colleges enrolling more than half of their students in online programs. Seeking cost-efficiency, scale and the chance to reach more adult students, for-profits were early adopters. Today for-profits...

OLYMPIA, Wash. – Debt is a major challenge for some Washington families, and measures moving through the Legislature could give them a bit of relief. House Bill 1602 would cap the interest rate companies can charge on consumer debt collection after winning a court judgment at 9 percent. The current rate is 12 percent – the highest in the nation...

We all have heard the numbers about escalating student loan debt across the country. Maine is no exception. Residents of our state carry more than $6 billion in education debt. Excessive student debt takes money out of Maine’s economy. MECEP’s analysis indicates that education debt held by Mainers could support 6,000 jobs and three-quarters of a billion dollars in consumer...

The question of who is the worst member of President Trump’s administration could keep a dinner party entertained for hours. Is it Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, the multimillionaire who felt impelled to lie about being a billionaire? Former Environmental Protection Agency administrator and schnorrer extraordinaire Scott Pruitt? Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta, who, when he was a U.S. attorney, let billionaire...

This report addresses the trend of for-profit colleges going exclusively online or contracting with non-profit (mostly public) colleges to run their online programs. Using results from focus groups of for-profit student borrowers, Robin Howarth and Lisa Stifler explore the risks that this rapid shift entails for students already vulnerable to poor outcomes. The Department of Education is seeking to weaken...