If there was one key lesson from the recession it is that financial services need effective regulation. It took billions of lost wealth, largely through millions of foreclosures before lawmakers took decisive actions to ensure that never again would such financial calamity be allowed to happen again.
Nearly three years since the enactment of the historic Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform Act, the nation’s first-ever full-time, federal consumer watchdog, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, was created and began a steady and strong effort to serve the nation. With transparency, fairness and inclusion as its guiding values, CFPB’s new rules for a variety of lending areas are being enacted or considered. Regardless of the product affected, the goal remains the same: rein in unfair, discriminatory and predatory lending practices.
For communities of color, these efforts are particularly important. Black and Brown consumers together have borne the brunt of predatory lending in all of its nefarious forms. Through litigation in cooperation with the Justice Department, banks have been fined and restitution ordered for unnecessary foreclosures and robo-signed foreclosures. More recently, a lender was fined a half million dollars for its failure to observe new mortgage lending rules that took effect in January.