The Housing Mortgage Loan Consumer Protection Legislation Research

This thesis studies the most updated development of U.S. legislation on the consumer protection in house mortgage loan since the passage of Dodd-Frank Act after the sub-prime crisis, with the hope to find the significances and implications which could be of help for the work of China’s future legislation. This thesis has four parts.The first part introduces the development of this sub-prime crisis, preliminarily summaries its causes, and after identifying the nature of this sub-prime crisis and combining the consumer protection legislation passed prior to this crisis, points out the issues and challenges facing the previous legislation. This, therefore, triggers further discussion in the later part of this thesis.The second part introduces themost updated reform in the legislation on the U.S. housing mortgage loan, by identifying the macro goals and micro goals (having the clear macro goals in the legislation is also a distinct characteristic of this legislation), then by introducing the preparation for this legislation, including main study fruits, then by presenting the main content of Dodd-Frank Act, especially the part emphasizing protecting the consumers, and at last, by clarifying the attitudes of the most updated legislation toward to the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac-confirming the positive roles played by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and thereby stating that the reform shall focus on the blank area of the previous supervision:the unfair, dishonest and overuse practice involved the marketing in the sub-prime crisis.The third part analyzes the Dodd-Frank Act from the different perspectives: macro goals and micro goals, a more intensive definition of the consumers, and the establishment of a specialized agency for consumer protection.The fourth part evaluates Dodd-Frank Act’s efforts in protecting the consumers, by pointing out that the act is with clear supervision goal and that the mechanism and measures are far more in-depth and straightforward to the core of the financial products. It also presents the opposing positions from counterpart who questions the role played by this act. At the ending part of this thesis, it summarizes the significance and implication brought by this act and puts forwards certain suggestions for China’s future legislation.