Bush's Proposal to Congress on Mortgage Relief

Yesterday, President Bush unveiled his plan to help save the mortgage industry and homeowners facing foreclosure. Now remember, this is a plan that's been proposed to Congress.It's not law yet.

The Rev. Jesse Jackson, in a WSJ commentary says this will only help about 750,000 of the 6.5 million sub-prime borrowers.

And Barclays Capital says this will help only about 240,000 of the 2.9 million subprime adjustable rate mortgages that the Mortgage Bankers Association says exist.

Isn't the disparity in numbers fascinating?Where does Jesse Jackson get his figures?

And doesn't the Wall Street Journal verify numbers before printing them - even in editorials? (My Dow Jones editor verifies MY sources of information when I cite numbers.)

Regardless, there is some help out there. But for whom?

According to Liz Moyer in the Forbes article, "It also won't help the 16% of subprime borrowers who are already delinquent or in default, and it won't help millions of other homeowners who either will be deemed able to pay the higher rates when they adjust, starting in January, or who have the unhappy circumstance of having a house worth less than their mortgage or a loan that has already reset to the higher rates."

Is that entirely true? Well, according to the information on the White House's website, the plan is designed to help homeowners with otherwise good credit who are now delinquent in their payments because they couldn't afford the increases.

The other provision of the plan is to amend the Internal Revenue Code to avoid taxing the phantom income that arises from cancellation of debt, when these homes are foreclosed upon.

We'll have to wait and see how this plays out.

If you're in the affected group, I do urge you to contact your Senators and Representatives to pass legislation that can help you.