A massive settlement has been reached between the government and five of the nation's biggest banks over foreclosure abuses and relief. Our partner The New York Times says the $ 26 billion deal will be doled out to 2 million homeowners. It's part of a broad national settlement aimed at halting the housing market's downward slide and holding banks accountable. Joining the program is Nelson Schwartz, business reporter with our partner, The Times.

The Obama administration announced Monday that it will try and expand HARP, the Home Affordable Refinance Program, to reach to at least one million more people. HARP was introduced in 2009 to help underwater borrowers refinance their mortgages. At the time the administration predicted HARP would help millions of homeowners. But after two and a half years, less than 900,000 homeowners have refinanced under HARP. New changes to HARP will make it possible for homeowners whose mortgages are severely underwater to participate.

On the heels of the debt ceiling crisis, Congress has established a "super committee" to find ways to reduce America's debt.  The twelve-member committee began work on debt-reduction strategies this week, aiming to come up with a plan to reduce the deficit by $1.5 trillion by Thanksgiving of this year. But as lawmakers lock horns over where to find spending cuts, we've been asking our listeners for suggestions on how to fix the economy. One suggestion our listeners had was to boost housing prices.

A recent report examining Federal Reserve data found that African Americans and Hispanics were able to borrow 62 percent less to buy or refinance homes in 2009 than in 2004 (pre-crash). Mortgage dollars going to white borrowers also declined, but only by 17 percent. Other research, including a powerful study of foreclosure rates and segregation by two Princeton scholars, suggests that black and Hispanic potential homeowners face discrimination and difficulty at every stage of the home-buying process. In effect, after decades of being denied loans at all and being neglected by traditional financial institutions, suddenly minorities were sold the worst loans out there. “Obviously it’s impossible to prove an individual institution is prejudiced, but collectively they were,” said the study’s co-author Jacob Rugh. “Communities were left out to dry.”

In the 1980s and 1990s banks avoided lending in minority neighborhoods and Blacks and Latinos were denied mortgages at disproportionately higher rates than equally credit-worthy whites. Redlining and mortgage discrimination was the norm. It seemed those days came to an end in the 2000s, when mortgage lenders began lending eagerly to anyone they could, and instead of being accused of avoiding minority borrowers, faced accusations of predatory lending in minority communities. However, now the tide has turned once again.

Wall Street bankers allegedly profited from the many mortgage loans that began to sour back in 2008, in some cases possibly pocketing money that was collected on the mortgages. Louise Story, Wall Street and finance reporter for  The New York Times, examines this theory, which surfaced in a recently unsealed lawsuit against a mortgage unit at Bear Stearns. She follows a money trail that seems to lead back to some shady action on Wall Street.

A dip in housing prices is causing concerns that we might be headed for a double-dip in the market this spring. Louise Story, Wall Street and Finance Reporter for The New York Times, says the latest housing numbers out by the Case-Shiller Index raises more questions than answers about the housing market in the near term.

The Obama administration is weighing a decision that could fundamentally change the way Americans buy houses. Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase and other large banks are pressing the Treasury Department to allow private companies to bundle individual mortgages into securities, which the government would guarantee. Should this very public role be given to big banks? Should tax-payers be on the hook for guaranteeing mortgages?

Big banks and over-committed mortgage-holders have been under the foreclosure microscope for a long time. Foreclosure lawyers are next up for scrutiny; according to an article from The New York Times, an increasing number of judges are accusing lawyers of processing inaccurate and even fabricated documents in foreclosure actions when representing banks. Are these accusations accurate, and if so, what is the source of the problem? 

Bank of America announced a $2.8 billion settlement with Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae on Monday. The American-owned firms demanded that Bank of America buy back mortgages whose quality was misrepresented by Countrywide, which is owned by Bank of America. Louise Story, Wall Street and finance reporter for The New York Times analyzes the implications of the settlement.

At least 40 states' attorneys general across the country will launch an investigation into the mortgage servicing industry today, which will possibly result in a push for a national moratorium on foreclosures. If they do, it comes as a response to recent announcements by several major banks, who admitted submitting fraudulent or erroneous documents in their foreclosure programs as they worked through massive amounts of foreclosure paperwork.

Some home owners are putting a halt to their foreclosures by pointing to flaws in the bank's paperwork. It's even leading to some backs putting a moratorium on all their foreclosure proceedings. We're asking about the times you stood up to institutions like this. When have you faced off with your bank, your phone company, your cable provider? What happened?

JP Morgan Chase has suspended the legal proceedings around 50,000 foreclosures because the documents involved may have been processed incorrectly.

Overwhelmed by the housing crisis, mortgage companies hired employees to process foreclosure documents as quickly as possible, without ever reading, reviewing or verifying the cases before them. The process is called "robo-signing," and it accounts for an alarming number of seized homes. By some reports, these hired clerks were approving ten thousand foreclosures a month—some of them in error.

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner convenes a meeting of mortgage analysts and economists today to discuss the future of mortgage financing. There will be a lot of nitty-gritty details, including the amount of debt the federal government should back and the proper role of securitization. However, there’s a bigger question that gets at the heart of American culture:  Is home ownership still a social good in and of itself? And how much should the government put on the line to encourage it?

We discuss the implications of the government's next moves, and we want your input: Should the government encourage people to buy their homes? Is property ownership a social good in America today? 

Mortgage giant Fannie Mae announced plans this week to institute a new rule penalizing homeowners who walk away from their mortgages. If homeowners are able to afford home payments, Fannie Mae says they will pursue them in court and restrict their access to future home loans for seven years. The decision will affect many home-owning Americans since the mortgage market is nearly completely controlled by Fannie Mae, and its sister company Freddie Mac, as well as the Federal Housing Administration.

Each week in our "Do-It-Yourself Bailout" series, we talk about how we can all get into better financial shape and bail ourselves out of debt. This week: credit scores.

• BUSINESS TAKEOUT: A year into the government's loan modification program, the Treasury's internal watchdog says the federal program might fail to prevent foreclosures. Meanwhile, private lender Bank of America announces major changes in how they will treat struggling homeowners. New York Times finance reporter Louise Story discusses whether the public or private sector is in the best position to heal the housing market.

• WASHINGTON TAKEOUT: Sure it's officially law, but that doesn't mean the Senate is going to give health care a rest. Our Washington Correspondent Todd Zwillich sat in on last night's 'vote-a-rama' where Republicans offered amendment after amendment in nine hours of non-stop voting designed to derail the final version of health care reform. He brings us the highlights and the final tally of votes.

As home values fall, more and more homeowners are walking away from their mortgage payments and foreclosing on their properties. And some say this is the right decision.

The Federal Housing Administration used to be a little-known government agency before the housing meltdown. But when Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac collapsed, the FHA started backing more and more loans to homeowners. Now, a growing number of borrowers are defaulting on loans backed by the FHA — and some are wondering if the FHA itself might soon need a bailout.

We find out how the agency is trying to weather the storm created by increased lending. We also get a first-hand look at how the housing crisis is affecting Cleveland, Ohio.

You might have heard of collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) and the role they played in the housing crisis, but have you heard of a 'synthetic CDO?'  Gretchen Morgensen and Louise Story report in today's New York Times, ("Banks Bundled Bad Debt, Bet Against It and Won,") on how banks used this special category of bundled debt to bet against the housing market, and win. Sometimes it meant the banks profited while their clients lost out.

Louise Story joins us to explain synthetic CDOs and the three government investigations that are already underway about the practice. The government wants to know if investment firms may have exacerbated the housing crisis as they tried to hedge their vulnerable mortage positions. We also speak with Sylvain Raynes, a structured finance consultant, to give us details on how firms used synthetic CDOs and how they pitched them to clients.