Today at 10:30 AM HUD Acting Secretary Alphonso Jackson announced that HUD is withdrawing its rule, will revise if necessary, and will republish it.

This is a reverse. A good one I might say. Was this political pressure?

Acting HUD Secretary Jackson, whose nomination as Secretary has been held up on this issue, cited comments from the OMB, SBA, FTC, Congress, consumer groups and business groups as the major reason for withdrawl of the rule. Of course this didn't bother HUD before. Jackson said it would be unfair to publish this rule without those who it affects having a chance to comment on it since it has changed from when it was originally proposed. One other tid bit, it has been reported recently that the rule has lost Whitehouse support, bad political timing may be the real reason for its withdrawl.

What rule is this? Have I been under a bushel basket?

It was a proposal, of major proportions. Some searches will yield results on what they were. However, they may be moot now.

Why do I feel as though we just received a telephone call from the governor? Whew!

Actually, I was looking forward to further clarification of the Section 8 prohibitions and dreading any new disclosure issues. RESPA continues to be poorly written with yet again no real relief in sight.

But you could hardly call the rule HUD was considering, or the one they proposed originally, to be improvements. Randy, we all agree that RESPA and Reg X are poorly written. But until responsibility for enforcement moves from HUD to the banking agencies, all we're likely to get is more of the same. This is the agency that still hasn't revised Reg X to reflect the 1996 EGRPRA changes!

All together now: HUD spelled backwards is ....