Indiana Mortgage Assistance Program Stops Taking New Applications

A federally-funded program that helps Indiana homeowners avoid foreclosures stopped taking applications at the end of June.

The Indiana Hardest Hit Fund provides mortgage assistance to people in danger of losing their homes.

It stopped taking new applications at the close of business Friday, after learning in the spring that it would need remaining funds for current participants.

Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority spokesman Brad Meadows says applications to the program have to go through local housing counselors, and that those counselors were told in advance of the new deadline. There does not appear to have been any other public notice about the change.

Meadows says current funding recipients aren’t affected by the shutdown, and that applications submitted before last Friday will be processed as normal. He also says the fund may start taking applications again if extra money comes available.

Meadows says the nearly seven-year-old fund has sent $140 million in mortgage assistance to more than 9,300 Hoosiers through the end of May. The program received $283 million total in five rounds of funding between 2010 and 2016. The latest round was supposed to be spent by 2020.

There are 19 Hardest Hit Funds nationwide, including Indiana’s. At least two others appear to have posted notices like Indiana’s in recent weeks. Mississippi stopped taking applications at the end of May, and Georgia did the same last Friday.