The American Housing Finance System

The course is intended for people who would like a deeper understanding of the American housing finance system. The focus will be on providing necessary background knowledge rather than on evaluating specific policy proposals. Near the end of the course, participants will be encouraged to bring up policy issues and to discuss them in light of the information presented.

Special emphasis will be placed on two factors. One is mortgage analytics, which means the measurement and modeling of default risk and interest-rate risk from the standpoint of the lender. A second factor is business process and industry structure, which means describing the tasks involved in mortgage lending and characterizing the firms that perform each task.