CFPB issues Bank of America $12M fine over alleged false mortgage applicant information

Bank of America fine overview: 

• Who: The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued Bank of America a $12 million fine.
• Why: Bank of America was accused of not asking the proper demographic questions of mortgage applicants and then telling the federal government that those customers had declined to respond to the questions. 
• Where: The CFPB issued the Bank of America fine from its Washington, D.C., office.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) handed Bank of America a $12 million fine after the company was found to have had hundreds of loan officers fail to ask federally required demographic questions of mortgage applicants and then said the customers had declined to respond to the questions.

The loan officers failed to ask the questions over at least a four-year span.

“Bank of America violated a federal law that thousands of mortgage lenders have routinely followed for decades,” CFPB Director Rohit Chopra said in a statement. “It is illegal to report false information to federal regulators, and we will be taking additional steps to ensure that Bank of America stops breaking the law.”

The Bank of America fine will be paid to the CFPB’s victims relief fund.

Bank of America knew many phone applications did not include demographic data, CFPB says

The federally required demographic questions come from the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act of 1975. The data is made publicly available as a resource for information on the U.S. mortgage market. 

“The public and regulators can use the information to monitor whether financial institutions are serving the housing needs of their communities, and to identify possible discriminatory lending patterns,” the CFPB said.

The discovery came from a CFPB review of loan data, when it found that ​​hundreds of Bank of America loan officers reported that 100% of mortgage applicants chose not to provide demographic data over as long as a three-month consecutive time frame.

The CFPB found that Bank of America did not properly oversee the requirements as well. The bank knew many loan officers receiving applications by phone were not collecting the data as early as 2013 but did not stop the practice.

This fall, Bank of America agreed to a $500,000 settlement to resolve claims that it violated Florida law by sending late-night debt-collection communications to account holders.

Do you have a mortgage through Bank of America? Let us know in the comments.

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