Want to Help a Late Borrower? Give Him a Job.(Mortgage Scene)(Department of the Treasury. Troubled Asset Relief Program)

Byline: Paul Muolo

Plenty of ink has been spilled in the trade press about loan modifications. And plenty more will be spilled throughout 2009 and then some. Do loan mods work? Should the government spend taxpayer money to restructure thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of delinquent mortgages? Good questions one and all.

The devil, as always, is in the details. Loan mods can be tricky and complicated because of the legal ramifications. First off, what type of loan-mod plan are we talking about? If a lender/servicer holds a troubled mortgage in portfolio and the note has not been securitized it's then up to that lender/servicer to make a decision on a loan mod. But if a mortgage has been securitized and resides in a legal "trust" that's where matters get complicated.

Some investors (fearing lost income) will not grant permission to modify a note. They fear that they will lose money on not only delinquent loans but that it sets a precedent. They worry that if they grant permission on nonperforming loans what's next: subperforming and current mortgages that could go delinquent?

There's an easy solution to getting around investor concerns. The Treasury Department can use some of the $700 billion of TARP money to purchase MBS backed by delinquent subprime loans. Once these securities and trusts are in the hands of Uncle Sam they can break apart the ABS/MBS into whole loans and do what they like with them. (That's how one mortgage bottom fisher explained it to me.)

The "buy 'em and break 'em" concept sounds promising but then again, Treasury has nixed the idea of purchasing MBS and ABS as part of the $700 billion bailout. Of course, that was the Bush Treasury Department. By the time you read this the Obama team will be just about in place and they can do what they want with the remaining $350 billion, that is, if Henry ...