GOVERNOR PALIN SIGNS MY MORTGAGE BILL

Governor Palin signed HB162 on July 12th in Anchorage. It’s a consumer protection law that requires licensing of mortgage lenders, brokers, and loan originators working in Alaska.

Alaska was the only state in the union that didn’t regulate mortgage lenders. Before my HB162 became law, persons working in the Alaska mortgage industry were not licensed and not required to have any training. Tattoo artists, and the person who cuts what little hair I have, and all kinds of other people are licensed, and must have training but, until passage of HB162, someone who attempted to arrange a mortgage home mortgage for your kid, or your mother, needed no training or license whatsoever. Not only that, none of these people were required to have background checks, and were not subject to periodic examination by the Division of Banking and Securities. This bill fixed that.

For most of us, the biggest loan we’ll ever get in our lifetime is the mortgage on our home. If we don’t get the right loan, with the right terms, it can be a very expensive thirty year mistake. Most of us who take out a mortgage don’t know much about the hidden mechanisms and inner workings of these loans, or ever changing state and federal mortgage laws - it seems like something’s different every day.
I recognized that fact every day when I was a working Realtor. My first step, when I was fortunate enough to have a homebuyer, was to take that homebuyer to lender who knew what they were doing - a lender I had reason to believe knew the law, a lender who was qualified to match a proper loan to my buyer, work through any problems, and whom I had reason to believe was honest. Having a good lender can be even more important than finding a buyer the perfect house in the perfect location.

My bill enjoyed strong support from the Alaska Mortgage Bankers Association, the Alaska Mortgage Brokers Association, the Alaska Independent Lenders Association, the Alaska Division of Banking, and Realtors throughout the state. I was proud to have my son and daughter-in-law John and Ann Lynn , and grandkids EDthan and Simon Lynn wittness their first bill sigining. See
picture below.