Obama Says 'We Can't Wait'; It's Time to Build

President unleashes new rules on housing and foreclosure policies

Yesterday, amid reports that President Obama's housing market policies had been declared an official failure in the media, Obama unveiled a suite of new rules to stimulate those policies and help more struggling homeowners out.

Among those new rules:

• Eliminating the maximum cap on underwater borrowers who can participate in program to refinance their mortgage loans.
• Getting rid of risk-based fees attached to the refinance program
• Extending the months of forbearance on lopsided loans for unemployed homeowners from four months to twelve months.

Obama is also looking to streamline the process of transitioning federally owned properties that have been recently foreclosed on into rental properties, and is allocating $7.6 billion from Treasury to the states hardest hit by foreclosures.

The president spoke in Las Vegas, one city that has struggled a lot in one of the hardest hit states of Nevada. Calling for a new housing program called "Project Rebuild" under the new mantra "we can't wait," Obama said in Las Vegas, "These steps that I’ve highlighted today, they're not going to solve all the problems in the housing market here in Nevada or across the country.  Given the magnitude of the housing bubble and the huge inventory of unsold homes in places like Nevada, it's going to take time to solve these challenges.  We still need Congress to pass the jobs bill.  We still need them to move forward on Project Rebuild so we can have more homes like this, and wonderful families having an opportunity to live out the American Dream."