9.06.2000 ET

(CSRwire) Freddie Mac today announced that Fulton and DeKalb Counties in Georgia have joined the "Don't Borrow Trouble" campaign being launched in Atlanta to alert local families about the dangers of predatory lending.

The "Don't Borrow Trouble" campaign uses a mix of ads, websites, and public service announcements in English and Spanish to educate borrowers about predatory lending practices and encourage them to call a toll free phone number for referrals to local government and non-profit agencies to help them understand and resolve specific lending problems. Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino and the Massachusetts Community Banking Council created the "Don't Borrow Trouble" campaign earlier this year.

"We believe that this Metro Atlanta "Don't Borrow Trouble" effort will increase public awareness on the importance of making informed decisions about credit and housing. Predatory lending and high foreclosure rates are affecting many citizens throughout the area and the state," says Liane Levetan, DeKalb County's Chief Executive Officer.

"We strongly support the efforts of Freddie Mac, as well as our Federal and State governments, to protect the elderly and minority residents of Fulton County from 'sham mortgage lenders,'" said Commissioner Emma Darnell, Vice Chair of the Fulton County Board of Commissioners. "Too many homeowners are losing their homes because of the heinous practice of predatory lending," said Darnell.

In addition to Atlanta-Dekalb-Fulton, Freddie Mac is also in the process of launching "Don't Borrow Trouble" campaigns in Chicago, Baltimore, New Orleans, Los Angeles, Oakland, Raleigh-Durham (and Eastern North Carolina), Washington, DC, Cleveland, Buffalo, Syracuse, and Las Vegas.

Freddie Mac will provide seed funding and technical assistance over the next year to help the different communities launch the local "Don't Borrow Trouble" campaigns. Additional on-site training will be provided by the Boston-based National Consumer Law Center, which provided training for Boston's campaign. Local "Don't Borrow Trouble" campaigns will be implemented by local government agencies in cooperation with a network of local partners, such as non-profit housing providers, credit counseling agencies, fair housing associations, industry groups and responsible lenders.

"We are delighted that the leaders and community groups in Atlanta, DeKalb and Fulton are stepping up to the challenge to protect families and their homesteads from lenders who make their money by preying on home equity," said Dwight P. Robinson, Freddie Mac's senior vice president of corporate relations. "DeKalb and Fulton Counties' decision to join the 'Don't Borrow Trouble' campaign will add even more momentum in the fight against predatory lending."

Making the "Don't Borrow Trouble" campaign available in cities across the country is the latest in a series of actions by Freddie Mac to help protect borrowers from predatory-lending practices. These steps include a ban on the purchase of mortgages with single-premium credit insurance policies and requiring subprime lenders to accurately and fully report borrower credit files to credit repositories, as well as the introduction of innovative loan products for borrowers with credit issues.

Freddie Mac is a stockholder-owned corporation chartered by Congress in 1970 to create a continuous flow of funds to mortgage lenders. By supplying lenders with the money to make mortgages and packaging the mortgages into marketable securities, Freddie Mac sustains a stable mortgage credit system and reduces the mortgage rates paid by homebuyers. Over the years, Freddie Mac has opened doors for one in six homebuyers in America.

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