Mortgage-finance companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac yesterday provided details of new low-down-payment mortgage programs that could reduce costs for first-time and lower-income home buyers, providing a boost to a segment largely absent from the housing market for the last few years, the Wall Street Journal reported today. The mortgage-finance companies and their regulator, the Federal Housing Finance Agency, said that the companies would start to back mortgages with down payments of as little as 3 percent, and that the loans would be available to first-time home buyers, borrowers who haven’t owned a home for at least a few years and to those who have lower incomes. The new loans could be most popular among high-credit-score borrowers who might have otherwise had to resort to pricey mortgages backed by the Federal Housing Administration.
