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34 The Exchange As SVP of Single-Family Portfolio Management at Freddie Mac, Kevin Palmer has broad responsibility for the Single-Family portfolio, including Freddie Mac's guarantee book of business, pricing and analytics, servicing, and REO. He also leads Single-Family Credit Risk Transfer (CRT), including Freddie Mac STACR® securitizations, ACIS® reinsurance, Whole Loan SecuritiesSM and front-end risk transfer offerings. Since 2001, he has served in a variety of other positions at Freddie Mac, including whole loan trading, managing the non-agency ABS portfolio, and risk management. He holds an MBA in finance from Virginia Tech and a Bachelor of Arts in economics from Weber State University. How do you view Freddie Mac's role in supporting the housing market through the pandemic and now into our nation's recovery period? is pandemic has been really difficult for all. One key role Freddie Mac plays, especially during times of stress, is to help provide liquidity and stability to the housing market. I think that support is one of the key reasons why housing has remained a bright spot during all these troubled times. Millions of homeowners were unable to pay their mortgages during this pandemic. Absent the support we've been able to provide, I think we may have had another crisis on our hands. For hundreds of thousands of Freddie Mac borrowers who fell late on their mortgages, we were able to roll out a broad forbearance program. Forbearance is a way to provide a time-out, a period in which borrowers are not required to pay their mortgages. In fact, not only are they not required to pay their mortgages, but also they're not reported delinquent to the credit bureaus, so the lateness does not impact their credit history. at gives them breathing room – time to get back on their feet again and in a position to be able to pay their mortgages again. Forbearance was a huge step in providing needed relief; we've also looked at what the right exit strategies from forbearance may be. How can borrowers gracefully go from a pause on their mortgage payments to paying their mortgages again without any issues? We've rolled out some additional programs such as Payment Deferral that essentially defers the amount of payments missed to the very end of their mortgages. is is all done interest free, and they're able to resume making their mortgage payments, which has been key to helping existing homeowners. We've also led a big effort to create broad awareness to homeowners about these relief options. Often, when you're unable to pay your bills, you don't reach out immediately. We made sure that borrowers understood that relief was available if they needed it. Another key way in which we've supported the mortgage market is through new originations. When the pandemic hit, we looked across all our different policies and procedures and said, "We want to continue to support this market, but we want to do it in a safe way, in a socially distanced way." So, we analyzed everything we had historically required to determine if we still needed those requirements and if we could adapt them in a creative way. We've seen a huge investment not only by us, but by many mortgage companies invested in digital platforms, and this has created an improved digital experience for many borrowers. We focused on investing in ways that have allowed more digital appraisals along with other measures to help streamline and automate processes, while still ensuring that the risk is being fully underwritten. at has allowed the mortgage market to continue to work and Kevin Palmer SVP of Single-Family Portfolio Management, Freddie Mac Get to Know Industry Executives Beyond the Boardroom "Forbearance was a huge step in providing needed relief; we've also looked at what the right exit strategies from forbearance may be."