The due date for responses to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) request for information (RFI) related to mortgage closing costs is this Friday, Aug. 2. All stakeholders interested in providing a comment should do so by that date if they want it to be considered in the bureau’s analysis.

“Junk fees and excessive closing costs can drain down payments and push up monthly mortgage costs,” CFPB Director Rohit Chopra said when the RFI was issued. “The CFPB is looking for ways to reduce anticompetitive fees that harm both homebuyers and lenders.”

As soon as the RFI was released, experts in the settlement services industry began urging their counterparts to take this opportunity to educate regulators on the importance of settlement services and what goes into the cost of them.

When the RFI was announced at the end of May, Marx Sterbcow, managing attorney for the Sterbcow Law Group, told RESPA News this RFI could set the stage for a “looming” RESPA reform rule.

“They are seeking to force lenders to bundle these legitimate charges into the cost of the borrower’s mortgage loan,” Sterbcow said. “In the end borrowers will have less transparency on why their mortgage rates have increased and higher borrower costs as creditors will just absorb these costs by increasing their mortgage rates.   The CFPB is of the mindset that it’s not what you do – it’s what you get the public to think you do in this illusion of lower borrower costs in the residential mortgage market.”

Those wishing to provide comments still have time to do so. Specifically, the CFPB is seeking answers to the following questions: 

• Are there particular fees that are concerning or cause hardships for consumers?
• Are there any fees charged that are not or should not be necessary to close the loan?
• Provide data or evidence on the degree to which consumers compare closing costs across lenders.
• Provide data or evidence on the degree to which consumers shop for closing costs across settlement providers.
• How are fees currently set? Who profits from the various fees? Who benefits from the service provided? What leverage or oversight do lenders have over third-party costs that are passed onto the consumer?
• Which closing costs have increased the most over the past several years? What is the cause of such increases? Do they differ for purchase or refinance? Please provide data to support if possible.
• What is driving the recent price increases of credit reports and credit scores? How are different parts of the credit report chain (credit score provider, national credit reporting agencies, reseller) contributing to this increase in costs? What competitive forces are or can be brought to bear on these costs? What are the impacts on consumers of the increased costs?
• Would lenders be more effective at negotiating closing costs than consumers? Are there reports or evidence that are relevant to the topic?
• What studies or data are available to measure the potential impact closing costs may have on overall costs, housing affordability, access to homeownership, or home equity?

  Want more perspective and information on the RFI? Find it here:

• Expert urges industry to respond to CFPB RFI on settlement services costs
• CFPB RFI on mortgage closing costs asks questions, raises more
• What are stakeholders saying about CFPB RFI on mortgage closing costs?
• 2024 Real Estate Compliance Outlook report