The preamble states that “after considering the statutory review factors, including a review of public comment, the Bureau has determined that the rule should continue without change. Due to a recent enforcement action taken by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) against a non-depository mortgage lender, the reverse mortgage industry may be able to take some lessons concerning its own compliance posture, according to an interview with a legal specialist conducted by RMD.Earlier this month, the CFPB issued an enforcement action against a Chicago-based non-bank mortgage lender and broker, alleging that the organization participated in “redlining” in metropolitan Chicago neighborhoods, meaning that the lender allegedly discouraged prospective applicants from applying for mortgage loans on the basis of race.While the specifics of the action may not be universally applicable to the reverse mortgage business, the fact that the CFPB issued this action against a non-bank lender and broker raises natural questions concerning whether or not the Bureau might more broadly target other non-bank lenders that operate within the realm of reverse mortgages, and what those lenders can do in order to remain compliant with applicable regulations and to avoid enforcement actions. Over the past several years, the industry has contended with a series of new rules and regulations handed down by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) or the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).Because of those changes, lenders who release advertising in forms of new media that are made available long after a point of initial availability — such as a podcast that continues to be available as long as its feed is maintained by the author — may be well-served by specifying around a legacy piece of advertising content that in the future, the regulatory climate around reverse mortgage products could change, and that the relevant piece of content may not be entirely reflective of whatever a current regulatory climate is like.This would be a step a lender could take out of an abundance of caution in ensuring compliance, even if a regulator is not guaranteed to go after them for old, continuously-available advertising that has a date attached to it, Shinohara says.“I don’t want to say that this could never happen, but the regulators typically can find enough current issues or violations of law — or what they believe to be violations of law — that they wouldn’t necessarily focus on trying to make a more difficult case involving retroactive effects of a new law or new interpretive guidance,” she says. This could have particular relevance to compliance in advertising practices.While the specific intricacies of this enforcement action do not appear, on its face, to have broader reverse mortgage relevance, it does open the possibility of reverse mortgage-specific enforcement actions if certain observations about industry practices take place on the part of regulating authorities. The CFPB currently has a job posting for the position of Associate Director for Research, Markets, and Regulations.. Thomas Pahl, who was named CFPB Deputy Director earlier this month, has held the position of CFPB Policy Associate Director for Research, Markets, and Regulations since April 2018. The CFPB has published its Spring 2020 rulemaking agenda as part of the Spring 2020 Unified Agenda of Federal Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions. RMD is part of the Aging Media Network.Receive industry updates and breaking news from RMD