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Reverse mortgage professionals in Massachusetts will be reliant on their borrowers’ ability to complete their required counseling sessions under the state’s face-to-face mandate following the expiration of a provision temporarily relaxing the standard that expired on April 1.

This is according to prior legislative documents reviewed by RMD and an announcement this week by the National Reverse Mortgage Lenders Association (NRMLA).

In an email update to its members, NRMLA explained that a spending bill containing an amendment that would permanently allow for telephonic and video counseling was approved by both houses of the state’s legislature, but that the addition of new amendments to the Senate version had prolonged the process that would allow it to become law prior to the expiration of the last extension.

The issue has remained a specter over the state’s reverse mortgage business for years. Massachusetts is the only state in the country to require in-person reverse mortgage counseling, a requirement that caused issues and effectively halted its reverse mortgage business during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Industry professionals and trade organizations — including NRMLA and the regional Massachusetts Mortgage Bankers Association (MMBA) — have urged state leadership to adopt a more permanent solution. It looked as if one would pass last year, but a revision of the budget bill deliberated at that time included an amendment that removed the permanent allowance from a prior version approved by the State House.

Reverse mortgage industry veteran George Downey of The Federal Savings Bank in Braintree, Mass. has been a critical figure in the advocacy for a permanent solution that would allow for remote counseling. While he remains apprehensive about the latest budget bill and whether it will include the desired language in its final form, he also shared that this time feels a bit different when compared to prior recent efforts to address this issue.

In addition to support from NRMLA and other trade associations, Downey said the outreach he and others have done on the issue has felt fruitful.

“We’ve done as much as I think reasonably could be done to get the information to the surface so that the conference committee members, when they were evaluating these various amendments, would have some sense of what this is about and how important it is,” Downey said in an interview. “So, I feel a measure of confidence in that regard. I’ll be optimistic and give us 50% odds.”

Part of the challenge in getting such a provision passed, he said, stems from longtime reputational challenges the reverse mortgage product has had that are difficult to challenge among lawmakers, he explained.

“It’s those old misconceptions, those old biases that carry a lot,” he said. “That’s just speculation on my part, but I’m pretty sure that that was the problem.”

Downey previously explained to RMD that there are only five full-time U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)-approved counselors serving the state. But the disruption caused by COVID-19 has helped lead lawmakers, regulators and the public to become more aware of how useful remote communication is today.

At the NRMLA Annual Meeting and Expo held last October in Nashville, HUD’s Deputy Assistant Secretary for Housing Counseling David Berenbaum alluded to the challenges in Massachusetts. He elected not to directly comment on them but said that there is no reason for HUD to believe that alternative delivery methods of counseling could not provide quality services.

“Our expectation at HUD is that the quality of the services should be maintained regardless of modality,” he said at the event. “And I do know from my experience in the space that superb housing counseling can happen in many different ways. It’s really the professional offering those services that make all the difference.”

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One of the biggest things that surprise American travelers moving across several European countries for the first time is just how easy it can be to cross between borders. When traveling by train, one can easily discover that you are in a different country only by looking out the window and noticing that the language on the station signs is different.

Established in 1995, the Schengen Zone is an area of open borders between many of the countries making up the European Union. The goal was to remove the need for internal borders within countries that already have freedom of work and movement as well as establish a common EU area.

Related: A country just went visa-free for visitors with any passport

While the initial signatories to the Schengen Agreement were only Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg and the Netherlands, the idea worked incredibly well and more and more nations joined over the next 30 years. On March 31, the coalition of 27 countries increased by the partial addition of Bulgaria and Romania — two nations that had long been slated to join the Schengen Zone but needed to complete a number of steps to prove that they properly address illegal migration.

Two more countries partially join 'the largest area of free movement in the world'

The two countries' ascension grants EU citizens and visitors who have already crossed through another port of entry free access by air and sea but requires some identity document checks at certain land borders for the time being. Bulgaria and Romania have been on the pathway to join the Schengen Zone since 2007.

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"I welcome the lifting of internal air and sea border checks," Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, said in a statement. "This is a great success for both countries and a historic moment for the Schengen area — the largest area of free movement in the world."

Prior to this change, Croatia was the last country to join the Schengen Zone in January 2022. The land borders for Bulgaria and Romania remain due to resistance from the member state of Austria about illegal immigration flowing west through those two countries. The partial ascension was called out by some lawmakers who felt like they were being asked to hit a moving target not required of other countries.

Here is what the change will mean for travelers passing through these countries by land, air and sea

"Bulgaria and Romania have been fulfilling all criteria for joining the Schengen area for years – we are entitled to join with the terrestrial border as well," Romanian European Parliament Member Siegfried Muresan said to the Associated Press. "[The partial membership] will offer additional arguments to the last EU member state that has been vetoing the full accession.”

Those coming into Bulgaria or Romania by plane or ship from another EU country will not need to show their passport at the airport or port crossing. Both countries have, in recent years, have seen a significant burst of tourist interest as off-the-radar European destinations that have become particularly popular following the pandemic but the vast majority of border movement occurs by land.

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