State Senate to take up issue of subprime lending and foreclosures

The state Senate Banks Committee is scheduled to take up the subprime lending crisis at a hearing today in Albany.

Last week, the Assembly passed legislation to impose a one-year delay on foreclosures when New York homeowners default on mortgage payments. But the Senate and Gov. David Paterson are talking about a delay of just 60 days after an owner offers to renegotiate.

The banking industry has opposed the longer delay, arguing that the foreclosure process in New York courts already makes it the longest in the nation.

Among those scheduled to testify today is Richard Neiman, the state banking superintendent.

He gave Paterson a report yesterday pulling together foreclosure and other statistics and outlining steps the state has taken to ease the effects of tighter credit and bad loans.

While noting that New York has not been hit as hard as some other parts of the country, there were 14,000 foreclosure filings in the first three months of this year, up 40 percent over 2007.

Queens and Brooklyn account for 32 percent of the filings, Long Island 24 percent and Monroe County 6 percent.

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press.  All Rights Reserved.)