Tales from Bailout Nation Pt. XV

From the files of “you just can't make up this stuff”...

Two U.S. Democratic lawmakers want Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to relax recently tightened standards for mortgages on new condominiums, saying they could threaten the viability of some developments and slow the housing-market recovery, the Wall Street Journal said.

In March, Fannie Mae (FNM.N)(FNM.P) said it would no longer guarantee mortgages on condos in buildings where fewer than 70 percent of the units have been sold, up from 51 percent, the paper said. Freddie Mac (FRE.P)(FRE.N) is due to implement similar policies next month, the paper said.

In a letter to the CEO's of both companies, Representatives Barney Frank, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, and Anthony Weiner warned that a 70 percent sales threshold "may be too onerous" and could lead condo buyers to shun new developments, according to the paper.

Cue feigned shock and indignation because the real thing left the station months ago. “It is what it is” as the saying goes because, as it is, from porkulus, to cap and trade, to health care reform and to the management of the housing/mortgage crisis, the 530 some-odd people currently acting as our elected national legislators resemble less an effective law-making body and more a flailing, shrieking, clawing group of individuals fully engaged in pro-creational activities that bear no coherent results.