We audited the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Federal Housing Administration (FHA) Claims Without Conveyance of Title (CWCOT) program.  We selected this review to assist HUD in recovering improper payments and to reduce the risk of losses to the FHA insurance fund. The objective of our audit was to assess whether HUD is appropriately demanding and collecting improper payments identified for CWCOT loans by its Mortgagee Compliance Manager (MCM). 

We conducted an audit on the effectiveness of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) program’s Life Expectancy Set Asides (LESA).  The LESA is a set aside portion of the HECM mortgage that makes property tax, hazard insurance, and flood insurance payments on behalf of certain financially vulnerable borrowers.  While not guaranteed, the LESA funds are intended to last for the full duration of the borrower’s life expectancy.

We audited the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Office of Residential Care Facilities’ (ORCF), oversight of Section 232 residential care facilities’ mortgage insurance program.  We performed this audit because HUD-insured residential care facility loan defaults were rising.  As of June 2024, 167 of the 3,670 HUD-insured Section 232 borrowers, or nearly 5 percent, defaulted on their mortgages.  These 167 loans had an unpaid principal balance of more than $1.1 billion.

Beginning in 2021, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Office of Inspector General (OIG) conducted several audits to assess HUD’s anti-fraud efforts and to develop inventories of fraud risks for several of its programs.  Our previous work found that HUD’s fraud risk management program was in its early stages of development and we recommended that HUD perform program-specific fraud risk assessments and incorporate these assessments into an agency-wide plan to further advance its program.

We contracted with the independent public accounting firm of Sikich CPA LLC to audit the financial statements of FHA as of and for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2025, and to provide reports on FHA’s (1) internal control over financial reporting and (2) compliance with laws, regulations, contracts, and grant agreements and other matters.  Our contract with Sikich required that the audit be performed in accordance with U.S. generally accepted government auditing standards, Office of Management and Budget audit requirements, and the Financial Audit Manual of the U.S.

We audited Neighborhood Loans, Inc., to evaluate its quality control (QC) program for originating and underwriting Single Family FHA-insured loans. Our audit covered the period October 2020 through September 2022.  We selected Neighborhood Loans for review based on its increasing loan volume and delinquency rate and because its rate of self-reporting loans to HUD when it identified fraud, material misrepresentations, and other material findings that it could not mitigate was below average for 5 of the last 6 years.

We audited Flat Branch Mortgage, Inc., to evaluate its quality control (QC) program for originating and underwriting Single Family FHA-insured loans.  Our audit covered the period October 2020 through September 2022.

We audited the HUD Office of Housing Counseling to assess its processes for achieving its goal to advance homeownership through prepurchase and postpurchase homeownership counseling, including its use of performance metrics and the collection and use of outcome data.  We selected this review because housing counseling plays a significant role in improving housing outcomes for home buyers, homeowners, and renters.HUD’s Office of Housing Counseling collects data related to housing counseling activity from its approved housing counseling agencies.  It did not, however, u

We performed an audit of CMG Mortgage, Inc., to evaluate its quality control (QC) program for originating and underwriting Single Family Federal Housing Administration (FHA)-insured loans.  We selected CMG for review based on its loan volume and delinquency rate and because its rate of self-reporting loans to HUD when it identified fraud, material misrepresentations, and other material findings that it could not mitigate was below average for more than a 5-year period.We found that CMG’s QC program for originating and underwriting FHA-insured loans was not sufficient.&nbsp

We audited HUD’s management of its FHA appraiser roster to determine whether the roster was accurate and reliable.  We selected this review because a prior audit identified weaknesses related to roster oversight and because this topic aligns with HUD’s strategic goals related to promoting home ownership and strengthening its internal capacity, as well as increased interest in the appraisal process.  HUD’s FHA appraiser roster was generally reliable.  HUD’s system controls prevented ineligible appraisers from being assigned appraisals on FHA-insured propertie