TheMReport — News and strategies for the evolving mortgage marketplace.
Issue link: http://digital.themreport.com/i/1484258
56 | TH E M R EP O RT O R I G I NAT I O N S E R V I C I N G DATA G O V E R N M E N T S E C O N DA R Y M A R K E T THE LATEST GOVERNMENT HUD Earmarks $1.4B-Plus for Disaster Recovery In a continued commitment to combat the effects of climate change, HUD has allocated $1.447 billion in grants to communities nationwide impacted by natural disasters in 2021. T he U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has allocated $1.447 billion in Community Devel- opment Block Grant–Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) funds to provide additional help to communities recovering from 2021 disasters, as well as support building inclusive resilience to climate change. "HUD continues to do the work to support recovery from disasters that have disrupted and, in some cases, devastated the lives of survivors," HUD Secretary Marcia L. Fudge said. "But we want to make sure that we are doing it in a way that is beneficial and equitable to those who were already underserved before the disaster struck. We must also push forward to build back stron- ger to prevent future destruction from disasters and climate change impacts as much as possible." HUD is allocating $1.447 billion to 10 local governments and 13 state governments that received partial CDBG-DR allocations for 2021 disasters, including Hurricane Ida, in March 2022. With the additional funds allocated, HUD has now allocated a total of $3.660 billion to these 23 communities to recover from 2021 disasters and build inclusive resilience to future disasters and the impacts of climate change. HUD's latest allocation is part of a total of $2 billion appropri- ated for disaster recovery in the Continuing Appropriations Act, 2023 that funded the federal government through December 16. HUD will allocate the remain- ing $553 million for 2022 disasters when adequate data about those disasters becomes available. As part of HUD's Climate Action Plan, an agency-wide strat- egy to advance climate adaptation and resilience, the Department is committed to steering disas- ter recovery in a direction that ensures climate justice and racial equity are at the forefront of these efforts. The Plan also supports the Biden administration's climate and equity focus found in the Executive Order on Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad. The latest estimates from CoreLogic of the damage and loss totals from Hurricane Ian found that total flood and wind losses will total between $41 billion and $70 billion. This estimate includes wind loss, reevaluated insured and uninsured storm surge loss and newly calculated inland flood loss for residential and commer- cial properties. Hurricane Ian was the costliest Florida storm since Hurricane Andrew made landfall in 1992. Hurricane Ian left its impact on the Sunshine State's overall housing market as well, as Redfin found that pending home sales fell 58% year over year in the Cape Coral, Florida, metro area during the four weeks ending October 16 in the aftermath of Hurricane Ian. That total is nearly twice the na- tionwide decline of 32%. Pending home sales also slumped in the nearby Naples (-52%) and North Port (-51%) metro areas over that same time span. Other Florida metros were impacted by the storm, as sales fell 47% in Miami, 46% in Jacksonville, and 43% in West Palm Beach, while sales were down more than 40% in the Deltona, Tampa, and Orlando metros.