Skip to main content

Search

Truth in Lending: 13.5.3.2.1 Reading the formula

Leases specify that the consumer owes any past due lease payments that have not been made, plus any late fees, taxes, and the like. The consumer also owes an early termination charge that typically will be expressed either in terms of an adjusted lease balance or in terms of the remaining lease payments plus the residual value of the leased item. In either case, the lessor will deduct from the consumer’s resulting liability the car’s realized value at early termination.

Truth in Lending: 13.5.3.2.4 Calculations based on remaining lease payments plus the residual value

Other early termination formulas charge the consumer for all the remaining monthly payments plus the residual value less “unearned lease charges” and less the car’s realized value at early termination. Unearned lease charges are rent charges that are due in the months following early termination—that is, the total rent disclosed in the lease less the amount of rent included in the monthly payments up until the early termination date.

Credit Discrimination: 12.4.1.5.3 Establishing proximate cause in the wake of City of Miami—circuit court rulings

On remand, the Eleventh Circuit duly examined whether “some direct relation” existed between Wells Fargo’s intentional policies and the economic harm that the City of Miami alleged.89 With respect to the claim that the lending policies caused property values to drop, thereby leading to diminished tax revenues, the Eleventh Circuit held that the City’s complaint met the Supreme Court’s proximate cause standard.90 The bank’s practices caused an injury to the City that was quantifiable and dist

Home Foreclosures: 4.6.2a MERS State-Specific Exceptions

MERS’s value to the lending industry rests upon its claim to offer an alternative recording system that operates uniformly nationwide. Because state foreclosure laws are far from uniform, MERS has been forced to react to certain state court rulings that found the MERS business model out of sync with state laws.

Repossessions: 12.9.3.4a State Statutes Other than the UCC

State law other than the UCC may provide additional protections for co-signers. For example, an Illinois statute requires a notice be sent to the co-signor of the primary obligor’s delinquency, and fifteen days must elapse before the creditor can report negatively on the co-signer to a consumer reporting agency.609

Fair Debt Collection: B.2.4 Debt Collection Practices (Regulation F); Time-Barred Debt

The CFPB issued an advisory opinion clarifying that entities that qualify as debt collectors under the FDCPA that bring or threaten to bring state court foreclosure actions on time-barred mortgage debt may violate Regulation F § 1006.26—even if the debt collector did not know that the debt was time barred. See 88 Fed. Reg. 26,475 (May 1, 2023).

Fair Debt Collection: 11.15.11b Redressability

The third requirement for Article III standing articulated by Supreme Court decisions is that the plaintiff’s injury must be one “that is likely to be redressed by a favorable judicial decision.”2111 An unpublished Seventh Circuit opinion holds that an FDCPA plaintiff’s failure to pray explicitly for actual damages did not mean that her injury, which included a modest expenditure for postage, was not redressable by a favorable decision.

Fair Debt Collection: 11.15.12a Pleading

Before filing an FDCPA complaint, it is important to interview the consumer carefully to identify any harm the consumer suffered beyond experiencing the violation.2126 A very small loss may be sufficient to establish standing.2127

Consumer Bankruptcy Law and Practice: 2022-04 Staff Notation

The CARES Act changes Official Forms 122A-1, 122B, and 122C-1 described in the 2020-04 Committee Note lapsed on March 27, 2022. The three forms have reverted to their pre-CARES Act versions (December 2019 in the case of 122A-1, October 2019 as amended in December 2021 in the case of 122B, and October 2019 in the case of 122C-1). In addition, the dollar amounts listed in lines 29 and 40 of 122A-2, and line 29 of 122C-2 are adjusted effective April 1, 2022, as part of the tri-annual dollar adjustments required by 11 U.S.C. § 104.

Consumer Bankruptcy Law and Practice: 2021-12 Committee Note

Official Form 122B is amended in response to the enactment of the Small Business Reorganization Act of 2019, Pub. L. No. 116-54, 133 Stat. 1079. That law gives a small business debtor the option of electing to be a debtor under subchapter V of chapter 11. As amended, the initial instruction in the form includes an exception for subchapter V cases. Because Code § 1129(a)(15) is inapplicable to such cases, there is no need for an individual debtor in a subchapter V case to file a statement of current monthly income.

Student Loan Law: 13.2.3.2.2 Reciprocity agreements between states

Under the HEA, institutions must be authorized in the state in which they are located in order to receive Title IV funds. However, federal regulations have largely left it up to states to decide whether a state must authorize distance education providers that serve their residents but are physically located in another state. This is an increasingly urgent problem.

Student Loan Law: 13.2.3.2.3 Federal regulations relating to distance education

Additionally, in September 2020, the Department finalized distance education regulations pertaining to eligibility for federal student aid under Title IV. The regulations took effect on July 1, 2021, but the Department allowed institutions to voluntarily implement them early.263 These regulations relax rules around how schools offer different types of distance education and “competency based education programs” that are eligible for federal student aid under Title IV.

HUD Housing Programs: Tenants’ Rights (The Green Book): 4.2.14 Family Self-Sufficiency Program

The Family Self-Sufficiency Program (FSS) is a program administered by PHAs and private owners for certain tenants in their public housing and Section 8 programs.233 Most PHAs have a Section 8 FSS program; a smaller number have a public housing FSS program. Additionally, in 2017, the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act permanently authorized the Family Self-Sufficiency program for Project-Based rental assistance properties.234

HUD Housing Programs: Tenants’ Rights (The Green Book): O

Occupancy standards: HUD standards for establishing the maximum number of persons allowed to live in an individual rental dwelling unit in HUD-assisted housing.

Office of Affordable Housing Preservation (OAHP): HUD office established to administer the Mark-to-Market program. It currently is involved in a variety of activities intended to preserve low-income rental housing and improve its financial and fiscal operations.