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Consumer advocates served as intermediaries between mortgage companies and borrowers during the Great Recession, and Framework Homeownership CEO Danielle Samalin sees them playing a similar role in the current downturn, too.
Founded in 2012, Framework Homeownership is a Boston-based consumer education provider founded by two HUD-approved nonprofit counseling intermediaries. It provides an online course that meets Department of Housing and Urban Development standards and fulfills education requirements for certain government-sponsored enterprise loans.
Samalin talked to NMN recently about the takeaways from the past recession that are helpful for companies trying to help borrowers and homebuyers with coronavirus-related challenges.
Below is a discussion with Samalin about those challenges and the role technology is playing to address them. Her responses are excerpted and edited for length.
What role did you have during the 2007-2008 housing crisis and how does it compare to the role you have now in helping homeowners and buyers contend with the coronavirus?
Between 2007 and 2012, I was at the Housing Partnership Network, supporting organizations created to respond to the foreclosure crisis. That crisis was a tsunami, and the organizations I supported had to ramp up fast to provide services and interface with the mortgage industry in new ways. They also had to access funding sources to do this, and a big part of my role was supporting these organizations' access to federal funds made available in response to the crisis. Framework, where I am CEO today, emerged out of this crisis. It was a way to reach consumers, at scale, using technology. Also, as a social enterprise...