FRHMDALAR_20211118_omb

Supporting Statement for the
Reporting, Recordkeeping, and Disclosure Requirements Associated with CFPB’s
Home Mortgage Disclosure Act Loan/Application Register Required by Regulation C
(FR HMDA LAR; OMB No. 7100-0247)
Summary
The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Board), under authority
delegated by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), has extended for three years,
without revision, the Reporting, Recordkeeping, and Disclosure Requirements Associated with
CFPB’s Home Mortgage Disclosure Act Loan/Application Register Required by Regulation C
(FR HMDA LAR; OMB No. 7100-0247).1 Although the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
(CFPB) is now responsible for issuing Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) regulations, the
Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) requires the Board to renew every three years the information
collections required of institutions the Board supervises.
The HMDA was enacted in 1975 and is implemented by Regulation C. Generally, the
HMDA requires certain depository and non-depository institutions that make certain mortgage
loans to collect, report, and disclose data about originations and purchases of mortgage loans, as
well as loan applications that do not result in originations (for examp le, applications that are
denied or withdrawn). The HMDA was enacted to provide regulators and the public with loan
data that can be used to (1) help determine whether financial institutions are serving the housing
needs of their communities, (2) assist public officials in distributing public-sector investments so
as to attract private investment to areas where it is needed, and (3) assist in identifying possible
discriminatory lending patterns and enforcing anti-discrimination statutes.2 Supervisory agencies,
state and local public officials, and members of the public use the data to aid in the enforcement
of the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, and the Fair
Housing Act and to aid in identifying areas for residential redevelopment and rehabilitation.
The estimated total annual burden for the FR HMDA LAR is 578,984 hours.
Background and Justification
On July 21, 2011, rulemaking authority for the HMDA was transferred from the Board to
the CFPB under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010
(Dodd-Frank Act). The Dodd-Frank Act also transferred the HMDA supervisory and
enforcement authority for large depository institutions over $10 billion from the Board, Federal
Deposit Insurance Corporation, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and National Credit
Union Administration to the CFPB.
On October 15, 2015, the CFPB issued final rules3 that expand the data collected and
reported under the HMDA, which is implemented by Regulation C (2015 Final Rule).4 The 2015
1

The HMDA is codified at 12 U.S.C. §§ 2801-2810; Regulation C is located at 12 CFR Part 1003.
See 12 CFR 1003.1(b).
3
See 80 FR 66127 (October 28, 2015).
4
These data fields are discussed in the “Description of Information Collection” below.
2

Final Rule also modified the types of lenders and loans covered under Regulation C. In October
2017, the CFPB issued a final rule further amending Regulation C to make technical corrections
and clarify and amend requirements adopted by the 2015 Final Rule, and also to temporarily
increase for two years the loan threshold used to help determine when lenders must report data
on open-end lines of credit.5 Information collections under the changes made by the 2015 Final
Rules, as amended in 2017, began in January 2018.
On May 24, 2018, the President signed into law the Economic Growth, Regulatory
Relief, and Consumer Protection Act (EGRRCPA). Section 104(a) of the EGRRCPA amended
the HMDA to exempt certain insured depository institutions and insured credit unions from
collecting and reporting those data fields that were required by the HMDA sections 304(b)(5)
and (6), as implemented by the CFPB’s final rules in Regulation C, if they satisfy certain criteria,
including meeting the applicable performance evaluation rating standards under the CRA.
In 2018, the CFPB issued an interpretative and procedural rule (2018 Statement) that
generally outlined the availability of the partial exemption for eligible institutions, and stated that
additional guidance on the applicability of section 104(a) of the EGRRCPA to the HMDA data
collected in 2018 would be forthcoming. 6 On October 29, 2019, the CFPB published a final rule
that incorporates this 2018 Statement and further implemented section 104(a) of the EGRRCPA
(2019 Final Rule). 7 The 2019 Final Rule also extended for two years, until January 1, 2022, the
current temporary open-end coverage threshold of 500 open-end lines of credit, but did not add
any new reporting requirements beyond those required by the 2015 Final Rule, as amended in
2017.
In May 2020, the CFPB published final rules8 that adjust the permanent coverage
thresholds for collecting and reporting data about closed-end mortgages and open-end lines of
credit (2020 Final Rule). The 2020 Final Rule increased the loan threshold used to determine, in
part, if a lender is covered by the HMDA and must collect, report, and disclose any data on its
closed-end mortgage lending activity from 25 to 100 closed-end mortgage loans in each of the
two preceding years. Relief from information collection with respect to closed-end mortgage
lending under changes made by this final rule became effective on July 1 , 2020.
The 2020 Final Rule also increased the permanent threshold for reporting data about
open-end lines of credit from 100 to 200 or more such loans met in each of the two preceding
years effective January 1, 2022, which is when the current, temporary loan threshold of 500 or
more open-end lines of credit expires. Relief with respect to information collection on open-end
5

See 82 FR 43088 (September 13, 2017).
This statement is discussed further in the “Description of Information Collection” below. See CFPB of Consumer
Financial Protection Issues Statement on the Implementation of the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and
Consumer Protection Act Amendments to the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act at
https://www.consumerfinance.gov/about-us/newsroom/CFPB-consumer-financial-protection-issues-statementimplementation-economic-growth-regulatory-relief-and-consumer-protection-act-amendments-home-mortgagedisclosure-act/ (July 5, 2018) (2018 Statement).
7
See 84 FR 57946 (October 29, 2019). This final rule also amended Regulation C to adjust the threshold for
reporting data on open-end lines of credit by extending to January 1, 2022, the existing temporary threshold of 500
open-end lines of credit. This final rule is discussed further in the “Description of Information Collection” below.
8
See 85 FR 28364 (May 12, 2020).
6

2

lines of credit lending under the new permanent threshold will become effective on January 1,
2022.
Description of Information Collection
The HMDA, implemented by Regulation C, requires covered financial institutions to
collect, record, report, and disclose information about their mortgage lending activity.
Regulation C requires a financial institution to report loan data under the HMDA
(covered institutions) if it has at least one home or branch office in a metropolitan statistical area
(MSA) and also meets certain coverage tests. The coverage tests differ slightly based on whether
a lender is a depository or a non-depository institution:
• Depository institutions are required to report under the HMDA if they have assets
exceeding $48 million 9 as of December 31, 2020, originate at least one first-lien home
purchase or home purchase refinance loan in the preceding year (regardless of other
home secured loans), and meet the applicable loan threshold criteria discussed below.10
• Non-depository mortgage lenders are required to report under the HMDA if they meet the
applicable loan threshold criteria discussed below.
Effective July 1, 2020, a financial institution that is otherwise not eligible for a partial
exemption under section 104(a) of the EGRRCPA, as discussed further below, is required to
collect and report all data points required under the HMDA on applications for covered loans
that it receives, covered loans that it originates, and covered loans that it purchases if it either
originates 100 or more closed-end mortgage loans or 500 or more open-end lines of credit11
secured by a dwelling in each of the two preceding years, in addition to meeting other applicable
coverage criteria discussed above. An institution only reports a covered loan if it has met the
loan origination threshold for that respective loan category (open-end or closed-end).
Effective January 1, 2022, the permanent loan threshold used to determine if a lender
must collect and report data on open-end lines of credit increases from 100 to 200 such loans
(met in each of the two preceding years). The new permanent 200-loan threshold replaces the
temporary 500 open-end line of credit threshold that will expire on January 1, 2022.12
Covered institutions must collect and report any mortgage loan secured by a dwelling,
including open-end lines of credit, regardless of the loan’s purpose. However, certain other loans
9

The asset-size threshold amount is adjusted annually based on the annual percentage change of the Consumer Price
Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers.
10
In addition, the depository institution must be federally insured or regulated, or the loan must be related to a
federal loan program or intended for sale to one of the government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs).
11
Under the 2015 Final Rule, financial institutions would have been required to report home-equity lines of credit if
they made 100 or more such loans in each of the last two years. The CFPB’s 2017 Final Rule increased the
institutional coverage and loan thresholds from 100 to 500 or more open-end lines of credit through calendar years
2018 and 2019. See 82 FR 43088 (September 13, 2017). The CFPB’s 2019 Final Rule amended Regulation C again
to extend the temporary loan threshold of 500 open-end lines of credit to January 1, 2022.
12
As explained above, the CFPB issued a final rule on April 16, 2020, that, in part, establishes the loan threshold
permanently at 200 or more open-end lines of credit met in each of the two preceding calendar years effective
January 1, 2022. See 85 FR 28364 (May 12, 2020).

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are excluded, such as unsecured home-improvement loans (which historically were required to
be reported prior to 2018), dwelling-secured loans that are made principally for a commercial or
business purpose, agricultural–purpose loans, and other specifically excluded loans. 13
Regulation C requires collection of a set of data points. For covered institutions that are
otherwise not eligible for the partial exemption under section 104(a) of the EGRRCPA, as
discussed further below, these data points broadly include:
• information about the applicant or borrower, such as age and credit score,
• information about the loan pricing, such as the borrower’s total cost to obtain a mortgage,
temporary introductory rates, and borrower-paid origination charges,
• information about loan features, such as the loan term, prepayment penalties, or nonamortizing features (such as interest only or balloon payments), and
• additional information about property securing the loan, such as property value and
property type.
In addition, Regulation C requires collection and reporting of information regarding an
applicant’s or borrower’s ethnicity, race and sex.14
An institution that originates fewer than 500 closed-end mortgage loans, or fewer than
500 open-end lines of credit, in each of the two preceding calendar years and otherwise meets the
applicable performance evaluation rating standards under the CRA is eligible for the partial
exemption under section 104(a) of the EGRRCPA and is only required to report a subset of the
data points under the HMDA for the respective loan category.15 An institution is not eligible for
this partial exemption, and therefore must collect and report these data points, if it received
ratings of “needs to improve” in each of its two most recent CRA examinations or if it received a
rating of “substantial noncompliance” on its most recent CRA examination as of December 31 st
of the preceding year. An institution only reports the partial set of data on a covered loan if it has
met the requisite loan origination threshold for that respective loan category (open -end or closedend). That is, an institution that originates fewer than 500 closed-end mortgage loans in each of
the two preceding years reports only a subset of data points for those closed-end mortgage loans,
and an institution that originates fewer than 500 open-end lines of credit reports in each of the
two preceding years report only a subset of data points for those open-end lines of credit.
Consistent with section 104(a) of the EGRRCPA and the CFPB’s final rules fully implementing
this statutory amendment to the HMDA,16 the Board estimates that institutions eligible for the
partial exemption report approximately half the data points currently required by the CFPB’s
final rules on the loans described above.
13

See 12 CFR 1003.2(e).
For the complete list of data points, see 12 CFR 1003.4.
15
Section 104(a) of the EGRRCPA provides a partial exemption to the data collection and reporting requirements
under the HMDA for institutions that originate fewer than 500 open-end lines of credit in each of the two preceding
calendar years. However, institutions eligible for this partial exemption are effectively exempt from all data
collection and reporting requirements due to the temporary 500 open-end line of credit thresholds provided by the
CFPB until January 1, 2022.
16
See 82 FR 579567, which provides that for loans subject to the partial exemption, institutions are exempt from the
collection, recording, and reporting requirements for 26 of the 48 data points currently set forth in Regulation C and
identified and defined as “optional data.” See also 12 CFR 1003.3(d)(1)(iii), which defines optional data to
encompass 26 of the 48 data points currently set forth in Regulation C.
14

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The CFPB collects the HMDA LAR data on behalf of the applicable Federal supervisory
agency, and the data is combined and aggregated for each MSA. Certain aggregated data area
publicly available, though the CFPB has yet to determine if the information collected in the new
data fields required by the 2015 Final Rule will be disclosed publicly (for more information see
‘Public Availability of Data’ section below).
Respondent Panel
The FR HMDA LAR panel comprises the following types of institutions, except those
that are supervised by the CFPB: state member banks, their subsidiaries, subsidiaries of bank
holding companies, U.S. branches and agencies of foreign banks (other than federal branches,
federal agencies, and insured state branches of foreign banks), commercial lending companies
owned or controlled by foreign banks, and organizations operating under section 25 or 25A of
the Federal Reserve Act (12 U.S.C. §§ 601-604a; 611-631). The CFPB supervises, in addition to
nonbank entities, insured depository institutions with over $10 billion in assets and their affiliates
(including affiliates that are themselves depository institutions regardless of asset size and
subsidiaries of such affiliates).
Time Schedule for Information Collection
Recordkeeping Requirements
Under Regulation C, a covered institution must record data from covered mortgage
lending applications and loans, which it then reports to the applicable Federal supervisory
agency, discussed below in “Reporting Requirements.” An institution is required to record data
on each application or loan within 30 calendar days after the end of the calendar quarter during
which the institution took final action.
A covered institution is also subject to recordkeeping requirements after data is reported.
For three years, a covered institution is required to retain its loan application register (LAR or
HMDA LAR), the document which contains the recorded data on each application and loan .
Financial institutions may maintain their annual HMDA LARs in either paper or electronic form.
Reporting Requirements
A covered institution is required to submit to the applicable Federal supervisory agency a
completed LAR. Each covered institution is required to submit annually the completed LAR in
electronic format to the applicable Federal supervisory agency by March 1 st of the year following
the year covered by the LAR.
In addition, effective January 1, 2020, institutions with a high volume of lending must
also electronically submit their HMDA data for the first three quarters of the year on a quarterly
basis, within 60 days of the end of each quarter.17 Those institutions subject to quarterly
reporting requirements (quarterly reporters) will be those that reported 60 ,000 or more
applications and covered loans (combined) in the preceding calendar year, excluding purchased
17

See 12 CFR 1003.5(a)(1)(ii).

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loans. Quarterly reporters are not required to certify their quarterly reports for accuracy but
continue to be required to submit certified HMDA data on an annual basis (i.e., March 1 st annual
report). In addition, all reporting institutions that submit incorrect information may be required to
correct and resubmit the information.
Disclosure Requirements
The Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC) prepares an individual
disclosure statement for each financial institution using the HMDA data that each financial
institution submits on its HMDA LAR, and provides a notice to the covered institution when
such statement is available. Within three business days of receiving the notice from the FFIEC,
the institution must make available to the public upon request, for five years, a written notice that
states the institution’s disclosure statement may be obtained on the CFPB’s website at
https://www.consumerfinance.gov/data-research/hmda/.
In addition, for three years, a covered institution is required to provide to the public upon
request a notice that its modified HMDA LAR, which is the institution’s LAR that has certain
information redacted to protect the privacy of its applicants and borrowers, can be obtained on
the CFPB’s website at https://www.consumerfinance.gov/data-research/hmda/.18
A financial institution must also post in the lobby of its home office and each branch
office physically located in an MSA or Metropolitan Division (MD) a general notice about the
availability of its HMDA data on the CFPB’s website. Regulation C provides sample language
that covered institutions can use for these purposes. 19
Public Availability of Data
Financial institutions’ public disclosure statements, as modified by the CFPB for
purposes of applicant and borrower privacy, as well as aggregate HMDA data reports, are
available on the CFPB’s website at https://www.consumerfinance.gov/data-research/hmda/ and
are also available on the FFIEC’s website at https://ffiec.cfpb.gov/.
Legal Status
The FR HMDA LAR is authorized pursuant to section 304(j) of the HMDA, which
requires that the CFPB prescribe by regulation the form of loan application register information
that must be reported by covered financial institutions (12 U.S.C. § 2803(j)). Section 1003.5 of
Regulation C implements this statutory provision, and requires covered financial institutions to
submit reports to their appropriate federal agency (12 CFR Part 1003.5). Section 304(h)(2)(A) of
the HMDA designates the Board as the appropriate agency with respect to the entities described
above (12 U.S.C. § 2803(h)(2)(A)). The FR HMDA LAR is mandatory.
The HMDA requires the information collected on the FR HMDA LAR to be made
available to the general public in the form required under regulations prescribed by the CFPB
18
19

See 12 CFR 1003.5(b)(2).
See 12 CFR 1003.5(e).

6

(12 U.S.C. § 2803(j)). The CFPB is authorized to redact or modify the scope of the information
before it is publicly disclosed to protect the privacy of loan applicants and to protect depository
institutions from liability under any federal or state privacy law (12 U.S.C. § 2803(j)(2)(B)). The
redacted information may be kept confidential under exemption 6 of the Freedom of Information
Act, which protects from release information that, if disclosed, would “constitute a clearly
unwarranted invasion of personal privacy” (5 U.S.C. § 552(b)(6)).
Consultation Outside the Agency
There has been no consultation outside the Federal Reserve System.
Public Comments
On July 19, 2021, the Board published an initial notice in the Federal Register (86 FR
38090) requesting public comment for 60 days on the extension, without revision, of the
FR HMDA LAR. The comment period for this notice expired on September 17, 2021. The Board
did not receive any comments. The Board adopted the extension, without revision, of the
FR HMDA LAR as originally proposed. On November 4, 2021, the Board published a final
notice in the Federal Register (86 FR 60816).
Estimate of Respondent Burden
The Board relied on the CFPB’s burden estimate methodology for all adopted burden
calculations herein. For the purpose of calculating burden, the CFPB places institutions into one
of three tiers, and the Board followed this approach. Tier 1 denotes an institution with the highest
level of complexity, tier 2 denotes a representative financial institution with a moderate level of
complexity, and tier 3 denotes a representative financial institution with the lowest level of
complexity.
The CFPB assumes that, for institutions reporting closed-end mortgage loans (referenced
herein as “closed-end reporters”), the tier 1 representative financial institution has 50,000
records, the tier 2 representative has 1,000 records, and the tier 3 representative has 50 records
on the HMDA LAR.
For institutions reporting open-end mortgage loans (referenced herein as “open-end
reporters”), the CFPB adopted the three-tier approach and most of the key assumptions used for
closed-end reporters above, with two modifications. First, for the representative low-complexity
open-end reporter, the CFPB assumes that the number of open-end lines of credit applications
would be 150. This was set to both accommodate the current permanent threshold of 100 openend lines of credit and to reasonably reflect the likely distribution among the smallest open -end
reporters based on the CFPB’s estimated number of likely open-end reporters and their volumes.
Second, for the representative high-complexity open-end reporter, the CFPB assumes that the
number of open-end line of credit applications would be 30,000. This reflects a reasonable
distribution among the largest open-end reporters based on the CFPB’s estimated number of
likely open-end reporters and their volumes. The CFPB assumes that the number of open-end

7

line of credit applications for the representative moderate-complexity open-end reporter would
still be 1,000, just as for the moderate-complexity closed-end reporter.
Reporting
The CFPB considers most tasks that financial institutions undertake to gather and report
data as covered by the reporting requirements. Under the CFPB’s methodology, the reporting
requirements encompass transcribing data, resolving reportability questions, transferring data to
HMDA Management System (HMS), geocoding, standard annual edit and internal checks,
researching questions, resolving question responses, checking post-submission edits, filing postsubmission documents, creating public loan application register, distributing public loan
application register, distributing disclosure report, using vendor HMS software, training, internal
audits, external audits, exam preparation, and exam assistance. The CFPB estimates that annuallyreporting tier 3, tier 2, and tier 1 financial institutions would spend approximately 107 hours,
1,232 hours, and 5,969 hours per year meeting reporting requirements, respectively.
An institution that is eligible for the partial exemption under section 104(a) of EGRRCPA
is only required to report a subset of the data points required under HMDA if it originates fewer
than 500 closed-end mortgage loans, but at least 100 closed-end mortgage loans, in each of the
two preceding calendar years. For Board-supervised institutions, this partial exemption applies to
all tier 3 institutions and a majority of the tier 2 institutions (Tier 3 Partial Reporter or Tier 2
Partial Reporter, respectively). The Board estimates that tier 3 and tier 2 financial institutions
eligible for the partial exemption would spend approximately 64 hours and 986 hours per year
meeting the reporting requirements, respectively with the partial exemption.
Further, financial institutions with 60,000 covered loans and applications, combined,
excluding purchased covered loans, that are required to report quarterly are tier 1 institutions. For
these institutions, the CFPB estimated that it would require 934 burden hours in addition to the
burden hours associated with annual reporting.
Recordkeeping
Under the CFPB’s methodology, the recordkeeping requirement encompasses the
requirements that financial institutions maintain HMDA data for three years and disclosure
statements for five years, maintain loan application register information for three years, and
update information regarding reportable transactions quarterly. To maintain data, disclosure
statements, and loan application register information, the CFPB believes the primary time burden
is the time needed to copy this information to electronic data storage devices, such as a hard
drive or disk. The calculation of the burden hours for recordkeeping requirements is based on the
estimated cost of transcribing the data. The CFPB estimates that tier 3, tier 2, and tier 1 financial
institutions spend approximately 27 hours, 83 hours, and 4,130 hours per year transcribing data,
respectively.

8

Disclosure
The calculation of burden hours for disclosure requirements is based on the estimated
cost of creating a modified loan/application register, distributing the modified loan/application
register, and creating the notice for obtaining the disclosure statements. The CFPB estimates that
tier 3, tier 2, and tier 1 financial institutions would spend approximately zero hours, zero hours,
and five hours per year, respectively, meeting these requirements. The estimated time burden
would be the same for quarterly reporters and annual reporters.
As shown in the table below, the estimated total annual burden for the FR HMDA LAR is
578,984 hours. These reporting, recordkeeping, and disclosure requirements represent
approximately 7.6 percent of the Board’s total paperwork burden.
Estimated
number of
respondents20

FR HMDA LAR
Reporting
Tier 1 Annual Reporter
Tier 1 Quarterly Reporter
Tier 2
Tier 2 Partial Reporter
Tier 3 Partial Reporter
Recordkeeping
Tier 1 Annual Reporter
Tier 1 Quarterly Reporter
Tier 2
Tier 3
Disclosure 22
Tier 1 Annual Reporter
Tier 1 Quarterly Reporter

Estimated
Estimated
Annual
average hours annual burden
frequency
per response
hours21

3
1

1
4

131
308

1
1

33

1

3
1

1
4

439
33

1
1

3

1

1

4

5,969

17,907

6,903
1,232

27,612
161,392

986
64

303,688
2,112

4,130

12,390

4,130
83

16,520
36,437

27

891

5
5

15
20
578,984

Total

20

Of these respondents, 0 Tier 1 respondents, 197 Tier 2 respondents, and 25 Tier 3 respondents are considered
small entities as defined by the Small Business Administration (i.e., entities with $600 million or less in total assets),
https://www.sba.gov/document/support--table-size-standards.
21
The estimates of adopted burden in the table include reporting of closed-end mortgage loans for all respondents
indicated in the number of respondents column, plus reporting of open-end lines of credit for the subset of
respondents that will also be required to report open-end lines of credit. The total burden per respondent in the table
is total burden divided by number of respondents, and therefore does not reflect the specific burden hours for either
respondents that report only closed-end mortgage loans or that report both closed-end mortgage loans and open-end
lines of credit.
22
The Board estimates that the disclosure burden for Tier 2 and Tier 3 institutions is negligible.

9

The estimated total annual cost to the public 23 for the FR HMDA LAR is $34,246,904.24
Sensitive Questions
Institutions must generally request that applicants for covered loans provide information
about their sex, race, and ethnicity. For applications taken in person, the institution must
generally infer the information based on visual observation and surname if an applicant declines
to provide the information. 25 The purpose of collecting this information is to assist in identifying
possible discriminatory lending patterns and enforcing anti-discrimination statutes.
Estimate of Cost to the Federal Reserve System
The estimated cost to the Federal Reserve System for collecting and processing this
information collection is negligible.

23

All respondents of this information collection are considered to be the public.
Total cost to the public was estimated using the following formula: percent of staff time, multiplied by annual
burden hours, multiplied by hourly rates (30% Office & Administrative Support at $20, 45% Financial Managers at
$73, 15% Lawyers at $72, and 10% Chief Executives at $95). Hourly rates for each occupational group are the
(rounded) mean hourly wages from the Bureau of Labor and Statistics (BLS), Occupational Employment and
Wages, May 2020, published March 31, 2021, https://www.bls.gov/news.release/ocwage.t01.htm. Occupations are
defined using the BLS Standard Occupational Classification System, https://www.bls.gov/soc/.
25
See 12 CFR 1003.4(b).
24

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