Flush with cash from several strong years in a row, the Federal Housing Administration plans to roll out a number of "new products and ideas." in its fiscal 2001 budget.

Specifics of the FHA's agenda won't be known until Feb. 7 when the White House releases its proposed budget for fiscal 2001, so details are sketchy. But Assistant HUD Sec. William Apgar says "a wide array" of new programs are in the pipeline, including some specifically design to promote the production of new units.

Apgar, who doubles as the Federal Housing Commissioner, wouldn't reveal many details. But he said the various FHA insurance funds are making so much money that the profits must be reinvested in a host of new initiatives.

"Our front-to-back look at our business processes are starting to pay off," he said. "We not only improved our services, we've also improved our bottom line."

In fiscal 1999 alone, the FHA insured nearly 1.3 million loans worth a total of $125 billion.

The basic Section 203b insurance fund has come a long way since the days when it was "skirting negative equity," the federal housing official added. It's now "in the strongest financial position ever."

The multi-family insurance fund is in far better shape, too. So much so that "it's time put (it) back to work" as well.

Among the new initiatives will be one that will "link" the government's hospital and health care programs to the basic FHA insurance fund, Apgar disclosed. In an attempt to improve appraisals, another will created an automated monitoring system to identify appraisers who consistently do poor work.

The HUD official warned, however, than not all the new programs will work smoothly, at least not right away. Noting what he called Sec. Andrew Cuomo's "fire, aim, ready" management approach, he said the plan is to get the programs going right away and then fine-tune them.

Published: January 24, 2000

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