The House Financial Services Committee, voting on a bill to address problems in the mortgage markets, clears the the way for its voting by the House of Representatives. The bill seeks to overhaul the way loans are offered, securitized and regulated.

The panel voted for HR3915 out of committee to the full House of Representatives with a favorable vote of 45 to 19.

HR3915, where some sectors of the lending community strongly contest, will set minimum standards for loans including a reasonable assumption that the borrower will be able to repay the loan. It will also ask for a method for licensing mortgage brokers who are not appropriately regulated by the states or by agencies such as the Comptroller of the Currency.

The vote, which came early Tuesday evening would need approval of the full House of Representatives and then would need to be passed by the Senate and shall be signed by the president before becoming a law.

The bill also proposes liabilities for those who securitize potentially risky loans.

While the bill seeks to correct some of the longstanding practices that its sponsors believe have lead the subprime market to its current state there is nothing in HR 3915 to address either fiscally or legislatively the current fallout from those practices.

The bill, if it does pass both houses of Congress, will undoubtedly see many changes before it is sent to the president for his signature.

If you oppose HR3915 you can use the following template, contributed by one of our readers, as a starting point for a letter to your state representative.

Some people believe that it will be burdensome to the independent mortgage broker, anti-competitive, and will actually harm consumers.

Some organization are working on a petition to stop the HR1915 as they are already experiencing a tough lending and real estate environment and the bill will put additional unneeded pressure on real estate prices and cause unforeseen harm to homeowners, mortgage professionals and real estate professionals everywhere. It will also limit the choices consumers have in finding a residential mortgage loan to strictly large financial institutions.