Attorney General George Jepsen, speaking at an event in Milford today, said a multi-state settlement with mortgage lenders is perhaps a week away.
The deal would do a few things for the 40 states involved in the litigation, should it be reached, including making $27 million available to Connecticut, "every penny" of which would go to pay for legal aid for underwater homeowners, Jepsen said. It would also, theoretically, help out some homeowners who the attorney general said were victims of the 2008 housing meltdown.
"There's going to be money available on a state-wide basis to provide relief to those who lost their homes" between 2008 and 2011, he said. "Everybody who lost their homes during that period were victims in one way or another."
Though he wouldn't go into greater detail, saying the terms of the agreement were still being hashed out, Jepsen said the also create a "national monitor," paid for by the banks, to enforce the standards of protocol set out by the settlement.
According to Bloomberg news, the proposed multi-state settlement will resolve investigations into predatory lending and foreclosure practices by the nation's five largest lending banks: Bank of America Corp.,JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc., Wells Fargo & Co. and Ally Financial.
Jepsen said that, because only those lenders are participating, it will only cover about 60 percent of the market, and only in participating states.
Nonetheless, the attorney general was confident that the terms of the settlement would be positive for states and borrowers.
"This should help move the Real Estate market in the right direction," he said.