Triggered - Donald Trump Jr - House Rules: The Future of Fannie & Freddie, Plus Much More with Bill Pulte | TRIGGERED Ep.243

00:06:23.000 Hey guys, and welcome to another huge episode of Triggered.

00:06:27.000 Today, we have director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, Bill Pulte, who is off to a great start in supporting homeowners and homebuyers, great, hardworking, middle-class Americans so they have the ability to live their American dream.

00:06:44.000 And he's also rooting out the fraud in the mortgage industry.

00:06:48.000 The FHFA is one of those agencies you don't hear.

00:06:52.000 But it actually has a huge role to play in delivering the America First agenda.

00:07:00.000 It's trillions of dollars.

00:07:02.000 Here's Director Pulte recently discussing this mission to restore integrity to the agency and to enforce the rule of law.

00:07:11.000 Under President Trump's leadership, these are going to be great American icons once again.

00:07:15.000 Wow, you just came in and you started throwing the gauntlet down.

00:07:18.000 At Fannie and Freddie.

00:07:19.000 President Trump makes it easy.

00:07:21.000 He makes it easy.

00:07:21.000 Good for you.

00:07:22.000 You also launched a public tip line to combat mortgage fraud, encouraging people to report any fraudulent activities.

00:07:29.000 What's the fraud going on there?

00:07:30.000 We have significant mortgage fraud in this country.

00:07:32.000 It doesn't matter who you are.

00:07:33.000 Nobody is above the law.

00:07:34.000 If you are committing mortgage fraud, you are a risk to the system, and we are going to take the appropriate steps within our statutory capability.

00:07:41.000 Now, speaking of this, you actually referred Letitia James.

00:07:46.000 For criminal activity to the Department of Justice.

00:07:50.000 Tell me about that.

00:07:51.000 Well, the letter speaks for itself.

00:07:52.000 I don't want to comment on any specific case, but I will say that people claiming that they live in certain states that they don't live in, people claiming other representations that are maybe not necessarily true, these are very big concerns to the mortgage market.

00:08:05.000 It doesn't matter whether you're a welder, a plumber, a politician, an attorney.

00:08:11.000 If you commit mortgage fraud, you are a risk to the system.

00:08:13.000 And if we see it, we're going to have to say something.

00:08:15.000 And I encourage everybody, if they see mortgage fraud, say something.

00:08:19.000 We will take the appropriate action.

00:08:20.000 Well, do you think that the DOJ is going to take that recommendation?

00:08:25.000 You referred her for criminal activity, Letitia James. 0.98

00:08:28.000 Well, I would refer you to the DOJ, and again, the letter speaks for itself.

00:08:32.000 I would just say, as I said, that, you know, occupancy fraud is a huge issue in the country where people are basically getting loans based on certain down payments and certain interest rates based on saying that they live in one area and not another, as well as saying that they should qualify for loans that maybe they shouldn't have.

00:08:47.000 So, you know, just generally speaking, my thought is that mortgage fraud is rampant, and we are doing everything we can.

00:08:53.000 We've made a number of criminal referrals, not just the one that you mentioned, and we will continue to prosecute.

00:08:58.000 You know, within the confines of our statutory capability.

00:09:02.000 Bill, this is a very important and informative interview.

00:09:04.000 We appreciate it.

00:09:05.000 You got it.

00:09:05.000 Thank you so much.

00:09:06.000 Bill Pulte joining us this morning.

00:09:08.000 So we'll hear all about this with much more with Director Pulte in a few moments.

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00:12:05.000 Well, guys, joining me now.

00:12:07.000 The director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, Bill Pulte.

00:12:12.000 Bill, good to have you here, buddy.

00:12:14.000 Good to see you, Don.

00:12:15.000 Always good to see you.

00:12:16.000 Well, thank you again, director.

00:12:18.000 You've been off to a great start to use your position to really enact change and root out fraud and abuse, which is something that's just been so rampant in so many of these agencies.

00:12:29.000 But when you talk about your agency, I mean, that's literally trillions of dollars.

00:12:33.000 Could you first just talk about the scope and parameters of your job?

00:12:37.000 Because I don't think people understand the magnitude of it.

00:12:40.000 I mean, you make a major bank seem like a little itty-bitty baby bank.

00:12:45.000 And what you're really trying to accomplish over there.

00:12:48.000 Yeah, it's funny.

00:12:49.000 We were just talking actually in the other room about $300 billion, if you can imagine it.

00:12:53.000 And I said, wow, that's a lot of money.

00:12:55.000 And they're like, well, that's, you know.

00:12:56.000 More than the size of a bank.

00:12:58.000 But yes, we oversee about $7.8 trillion, if you can believe that here, in form of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which are the two mortgage giants.

00:13:05.000 And so I oversee federal housing, which oversees those two entities.

00:13:09.000 And then we have about another trillion dollars at a bank called the Federal Home Loan Banks.

00:13:14.000 And I'm very grateful to you, very grateful to the president.

00:13:18.000 And, you know, look, we're doing a phenomenal job, and it's thankfully due to the president.

00:13:22.000 The president empowers us to get done what needs to get done.

00:13:26.000 Also, Elon Musk, they give us a lot of air support, as you know, to enact the change, and we're taking costs out.

00:13:31.000 And, Don, we've saved hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars just in a short seven weeks being here.

00:13:38.000 Yeah, I know you said when you first basically showed up, I saw something go pretty viral online where you did one of these videos, you know, walking through buildings full of empty offices.

00:13:48.000 And when you're imagining seven-plus trillion dollars, I imagine there should be a pretty significant workforce.

00:13:53.000 16,000 people.

00:13:54.000 Yeah, how many?

00:13:56.000 16,000 people.

00:13:57.000 Yeah, that's a lot.

00:13:58.000 But I guess hardly anyone was actually in the office working.

00:14:02.000 I mean, you pay for the real estate, you manage the real estate, you have to upkeep the real estate, and no one's even there.

00:14:08.000 What shocked you most about sort of the state of the agency when you started seven weeks ago?

00:14:13.000 Yeah, I would say, Don, that people are MIA.

00:14:16.000 16,000 people are working from home.

00:14:18.000 And look, we can't lower what has happened in the last four years with this Biden inflation if we have people working from home and not writing mortgages every day.

00:14:27.000 You know, inflation has gotten out of control.

00:14:29.000 Home prices have skyrocketed.

00:14:31.000 People can't afford the American dream compared to the president's first term.

00:14:34.000 And so we need a lower cost.

00:14:36.000 Well, how the hell can we do that when people are working from home?

00:14:39.000 So we got everybody back to work and people love it, Don.

00:14:42.000 I mean, the...

00:14:43.000 The energy is electric.

00:14:44.000 When I first showed up, people were like, well, what's going to happen?

00:14:46.000 These days, people are high-fiving me in the hallway, asking for selfies.

00:14:49.000 I mean, we're in a mortgage company here.

00:14:51.000 We're not a Trump or something.

00:14:53.000 We're just mortgage guys.

00:14:54.000 But that's the energy that is being brought to these entities.

00:14:58.000 And frankly, until we showed up, nobody really cared about these entities, frankly, in my opinion.

00:15:04.000 So, I mean, you talk about you're not a Trump or anything, but you're a Pulte. 1.00

00:15:07.000 And for those who don't know, I mean, Pulte Homes, one of the largest home builders in America.

00:15:13.000 Perhaps there was a time where you guys may have been the largest.

00:15:16.000 Yeah, we were number one for a long time.

00:15:18.000 When our family ran it, we were number one.

00:15:19.000 So, I mean, so you actually come from a family of people who understands these things.

00:15:23.000 It's like I talk about my father and his ability to have success.

00:15:27.000 It's because...

00:15:28.000 He's actually done these things in the real world.

00:15:30.000 He's actually signed the front of a paycheck, not just the back.

00:15:34.000 He's had people's livelihoods and their well-being and their families dependent on their success each and every day.

00:15:40.000 And that's something that's so lacking in government.

00:15:43.000 Talk a little bit about just your family's background, because I think it's so important that a guy that actually understands not just the mortgage industry, but the housing industry, selling to regular people around the world for generations.

00:15:57.000 It's probably important to have any $7 trillion agency that does exactly that.

00:16:02.000 Exactly.

00:16:03.000 And, you know, our family founded Pulte Homes, as you had mentioned, which went on to be a Fortune 500 home builder, the largest home builder in the country.

00:16:09.000 But I made my money, actually, interestingly, in air conditioning, of all things, buying, growing, and selling air conditioning companies.

00:16:15.000 And so we're taking that same business-type approach to these companies.

00:16:19.000 And, Don, one of the things that was interesting was that these companies could get around the president's executive orders.

00:16:24.000 Because they're technically in conservatorship, which is almost like some people call it like a bankruptcy trustee almost.

00:16:30.000 And so what we did was we came in and executed the president's vision, even though they're in conservatorship and are running these things like businesses.

00:16:37.000 The president hired a businessman and we're going to run these things like businesses for the benefit of the American taxpayer.

00:16:43.000 And Don, these were once great American icons in the 60s, 70s, 80s.

00:16:48.000 One of them was founded in the 1930s by FDR.

00:16:51.000 We're going to make these great American icons once again.

00:16:54.000 Talk a little bit more in detail about the conservatorship standpoint, because it does seem like so much of this show is focused on the government intentionally or figuring out ways to get around the whole, hey, you report to the president, but no, no, no, you report to the unelected bureaucrats who are probably all enriching themselves along the way and have side deals with their buddies or whatever it may be in government.

00:17:17.000 You know, again, $7 trillion, you know, the lending arm of the U.S. government.

00:17:23.000 I mean, it feels like it should be in control of the president or who the people elect to fix the problems that are very real in the housing industry.

00:17:29.000 I think that's probably a big part of why they elected Trump, because he gets it like your family.

00:17:33.000 Talk a little bit about that, because, again, so much of what we see these days seems to be the end run to avoid any real accountability to report to an elected official and just have the bureaucrats running the show.

00:17:47.000 Well, I gladly serve the president.

00:17:49.000 And people don't, though, however.

00:17:51.000 I mean, I went into this entity, one of the top people, I don't want to say who it was, Don, but top people.

00:17:57.000 Wouldn't shake my hand, I think, in many ways because the person didn't like the president.

00:18:00.000 That was just my opinion and reading of it.

00:18:02.000 But it's crazy.

00:18:04.000 I mean, the people, what they've gotten away with in these companies is over with.

00:18:08.000 We are removing people who are bad news.

00:18:10.000 We're removing people who are committing fraud.

00:18:12.000 We've referred.

00:18:13.000 Many people in the Department of Justice, Don, we found foreign nationals from North Korea and China inside of these companies.

00:18:19.000 So we've got our hands full.

00:18:21.000 We're cleaning it up.

00:18:22.000 But like you said, we have $7.8 trillion.

00:18:24.000 This is the future of our kids and our grandkids.

00:18:29.000 And frankly, we've got to figure it out.

00:18:30.000 We've got $35 trillion in debt.

00:18:32.000 We had massive Biden inflation.

00:18:34.000 We've got a great president now, and we need to get the mortgage market there, too.

00:18:37.000 So I'm delighted to be doing it.

00:18:39.000 I left my day job for this, and there's nobody I'd rather serve than the president.

00:18:43.000 So you mentioned the waste, the fraud, the abuse, China being in there, taking advantage of these things at the expense, probably, of the American taxpayer. 0.91

00:18:54.000 How much of that was just...

00:18:56.000 Known but overlooked because either people were in on it or it was part of the swamp or whatever it may be.

00:19:01.000 I know you've done a real deep dive into all of these things to actually discover these things.

00:19:05.000 And there's no reason that the agency has to spend as much as it has or employ as many as it has when so much of this stuff seems to be literally only there for the benefit of either the deep state, the Democrat Party apparatus, or the swamp in general.

00:19:19.000 Well, Don, you're exactly right.

00:19:20.000 I was just in this room like 10 minutes ago, and the gentleman was telling me that he found another $100 million, okay, of waste.

00:19:27.000 I mean, this is literally what my days have become like.

00:19:30.000 You know, $100 million used to be a big number for me.

00:19:31.000 Still is, you know, in terms of net worth.

00:19:33.000 But I'm sitting here, and this guy's telling me this.

00:19:37.000 And then, so you normalize all these savings, Don.

00:19:39.000 Then you normalize the word fraud.

00:19:41.000 I hear fraud like a bunch.

00:19:42.000 Now, it's not systemic, so the mortgage market is safe.

00:19:45.000 The mortgage market will be safer under President Trump.

00:19:49.000 We're hearing fraud too much, and people are way too comfortable throwing this word fraud out.

00:19:53.000 So I've told people when we hear the word fraud, alarm bells need to go off in their head, and we need to do something about it.

00:19:59.000 And Don, as I said, we fired over 100 people who are facilitating fraud or involved in fraud in these companies.

00:20:06.000 We've referred people to the DOJ for mortgage fraud, and we're going to root it out.

00:20:10.000 It doesn't matter whether you're a politician, whether you're a lawyer, whether you're famous.

00:20:14.000 If you commit mortgage fraud, we're going to come after you.

00:20:18.000 Well, we'll talk about some of the politicians shortly, because it seems like they're certainly doing that.

00:20:22.000 But can you talk about, you know, perhaps you having the real opportunity to protect the homeowner?

00:20:29.000 What does this mean to the homeowner?

00:20:31.000 People who are going either through Fannie Mae, homebuyers, you know, again, by rooting out the fraud, restoring integrity to the industry, and actually holding those who abuse that power accountable.

00:20:43.000 Just how much mortgage fraud is really out there?

00:20:47.000 Well, think about it.

00:20:48.000 You had professors and academics and politicians in this job beforehand.

00:20:53.000 This president, for the first time ever, hired a businessman to go in there and run these things.

00:20:59.000 And my focus is making sure that the market is safe and sound, but that we're lowering costs.

00:21:03.000 Because as you know, Don, and you travel the country, people can't afford a home.

00:21:07.000 People can't afford their rent.

00:21:08.000 They can't afford until President Trump got in their groceries.

00:21:11.000 And so we've got a lot of work to reverse everything that's gone on these last four years.

00:21:17.000 And so to answer your question for the homeowner, we want to get the title insurance costs, the closing costs, the mortgage insurance costs.

00:21:24.000 We want to get all of these things down.

00:21:34.000 And so we need to restore housing in this country.

00:21:37.000 The American dream is what America was built on.

00:21:40.000 In the last four years, we haven't had it, and I'm very confident that your dad and our president is going to get it turned around.

00:21:46.000 Yeah, I mean, you mentioned whether it's title insurance or closing costs or all of these things.

00:21:51.000 Yeah, they are ridiculously high.

00:21:52.000 I mean, in real estate transactions, I mean, sometimes they can be points.

00:21:56.000 Points in, points out, points this.

00:21:58.000 Do any of these things actually do anything?

00:22:00.000 And what kind of, you know, if you're talking about points in and out, how much do you think you can actually cut that?

00:22:05.000 Because that's a really big deal.

00:22:06.000 You know, you buy a half a million dollar home, you know, a point is not an insignificant amount of money.

00:22:12.000 I mean, that's a lot.

00:22:14.000 It's just $5,000 just to get into.

00:22:17.000 That may be a little higher than the median home price, but $350,000, $400,000 probably.

00:22:22.000 You could probably tell me exactly.

00:22:24.000 It's a lot to the average person.

00:22:26.000 It compounds.

00:22:27.000 So you have these costs, and then you go and you borrow money to pay for these costs, and then you have to pay for it every month when you go to pay your mortgage.

00:22:36.000 So it kind of spirals out of control.

00:22:38.000 And to your point, you have the 10-year note, you have the 30-year note, but then on top of it, you have these closing costs, and they can be significant.

00:22:45.000 And also what can be significant are the down payments.

00:22:48.000 You know, it's a whole deal.

00:22:50.000 We're looking at everything, Don.

00:22:51.000 And I just, I can't say how grateful I am for the president's genius in terms of looking at everything.

00:22:57.000 And same with Elon's.

00:22:58.000 You know, they'll look at anything.

00:23:00.000 And if it's in the right, if it's in the interest of the American people, we are looking at it.

00:23:04.000 From title insurance to mortgage insurance to mortgages to how we're building homes to how we're financing homes to manufactured homes.

00:23:12.000 We are doing it.

00:23:13.000 We are on it.

00:23:14.000 Yeah, so, you know, for everyone else who isn't sort of, you know, again, I spent most of my career as a real estate guy.

00:23:20.000 I know you did, too.

00:23:22.000 You know, back in my business school days at Warden, we spent a lot of time with Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac.

00:23:26.000 Can you explain to the American people what is it exactly that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac actually do?

00:23:32.000 And how do you think that role should change or evolve?

00:23:36.000 You know, what happened in 2008 and, you know, the sort of the real estate collapse?

00:23:41.000 And what's the effect of that today?

00:23:43.000 Because it does seem, when you're talking about the money that you're talking about, you know, if you're going to save points on something, I want to save points on trillions of dollars, not, you know, I want to save points across the board no matter where it is.

00:23:52.000 But, I mean, that's a major agency.

00:23:55.000 You know, what's the effect of that today?

00:23:57.000 Well, the good news is I think we have a president who understands how much money is in this agency and how much money are in these companies.

00:24:04.000 I don't think that, certainly the last president, but I don't think a lot of presidents fully understood it.

00:24:08.000 It's just when there was a crisis.

00:24:10.000 One of the things I've observed about this president is that there's hundreds of billions, if not trillions of dollars involved.

00:24:15.000 Now, Franklin Delano Roosevelt set out this path for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac back in the 1930s, to answer your question.

00:24:22.000 And what he decided to do is basically with the GI Bill and otherwise, over the decades, was be able to get people liquidity.

00:24:30.000 Be able to get people, which is a fancy word for money, get people money to be able to buy mortgages.

00:24:35.000 What happened was, over the years, you know, classic swamp behavior, right?

00:24:39.000 If you work for a Democrat or you work for some crooked politician, you could get put on Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac's roles.

00:24:45.000 It blew up in 08. These guys, they were committing fraud, from what I understand, and they were doing a lot of other bad things, okay?

00:24:53.000 So this thing blew up, and it wasn't supposed to be in conservatorship forever.

00:24:56.000 It shouldn't be in conservatorship forever.

00:24:59.000 However, what we're focused now is trying to get it back more towards its original roots, providing liquidity, stability, and affordability.

00:25:06.000 And they veered away from all this with all this DEI stuff, lending people money, And we're going to keep going.

00:25:26.000 And as I said, we're doing a full-scale review of...

00:25:29.000 Everything.

00:25:30.000 Everything is on the table.

00:25:31.000 And the one determining factor is what is in the best interest of the American people.

00:25:36.000 So, you know, the mortgage industry is actually really tied to American safety, security, prosperity, really the American dream.

00:25:44.000 And especially where you're at, I mean, that is for, you know, middle class, hardworking, blue collar families.

00:25:51.000 You know, and I think that's such a big part of why my father's doing that, right?

00:25:55.000 It's probably far less for the elite and all of this.

00:25:58.000 How did it get off track under Obama and Biden?

00:26:03.000 There was their so-called fair housing rules, but it was really just an arm of the equity agenda.

00:26:09.000 What's the roadmap to fixing all of that madness?

00:26:12.000 Well, the roadmap, and you know this well, is, you know, my grandfather used to tell me the fish rots from the head.

00:26:17.000 And leadership starts at the top.

00:26:19.000 And we have a president who actually gives a damn about these things.

00:26:23.000 I mean, I'm here at Fannie Mae in New York today, if you can believe that.

00:26:26.000 That's one of our satellite offices.

00:26:27.000 I'm actually in these buildings.

00:26:29.000 They've never seen an FHFA director, U.S. federal housing director, in these buildings.

00:26:34.000 So it starts with leadership.

00:26:35.000 We've got to be here.

00:26:36.000 We've got to be in the game.

00:26:37.000 And we've got to count.

00:26:38.000 And I see this everywhere across the cabinet.

00:26:40.000 I'm not...

00:26:41.000 Technically in the cabinet, but I see it across all these cabinet members.

00:26:44.000 Everybody is in the game.

00:26:46.000 We are working our ass off and we're excited about doing it.

00:26:49.000 And I just couldn't be more excited about it.

00:26:53.000 I'm telling you, the feeling is electric in these mortgage companies.

00:26:56.000 I mean, these things are not sexy, but they're becoming like places people want to work at.

00:27:00.000 And that's what we want.

00:27:01.000 And frankly, I think these things are worth billions and billions, maybe eventually trillions of dollars.

00:27:07.000 I mean, that's a big deal.

00:27:08.000 I mean, when you're dealing with someone who's actually passionate about doing that, actually passionate about helping Americans, that's a much bigger deal than a bureaucrat that shows up there.

00:27:15.000 They're pushing paper across the desk.

00:27:17.000 We'll deal with it later.

00:27:18.000 So, you know, I think that's really important.

00:27:20.000 In places like California, though, I'd ask, you know, where homelessness is out of control, where prices are insane.

00:27:29.000 What role can your agency play in that?

00:27:32.000 Can you do more to hold the states themselves accountable to make sure that, again, these kind of benefits are actually available to the people they're intended to benefit?

00:27:41.000 It's a very good question.

00:27:42.000 I actually have an important meeting tomorrow on some of this stuff.

00:27:46.000 Eventually, it's an administration-wide decision in terms of how do we make sure that when we're giving all this money...

00:27:53.000 That we are not enabling some of these municipalities, both from a federal financing standpoint, and some of that would fall under the jurisdiction of HUD, not us.

00:28:01.000 But in the case of mortgages, I think you're dead on in terms of it needs to be looked at.

00:28:05.000 It needs to be looked at very well.

00:28:08.000 But we'll see what happens.

00:28:09.000 You know, again, we've only been on the job seven weeks, so we haven't gotten to that.

00:28:12.000 But I would just encourage...

00:28:14.000 These municipalities don't engage in nonsense, whether that's DEI stuff, whether that's being racist and discriminating based on race, or whether it's, frankly, mortgage fraud.

00:28:24.000 Because we see a lot of people thinking, I don't know if you saw this, but the Maryland prosecutor, Baltimore prosecutor, was charged with mortgage fraud.

00:28:32.000 And she actually, as I understood it, got convicted of... 0.99

00:28:35.000 Some level of fraud and ended up having to do some work.

00:28:39.000 She had to stay at home in terms of being in prison.

00:28:42.000 So my point being is just like, the stuff needs to stop.

00:28:46.000 The mortgage fraud needs to stop.

00:28:47.000 The politicians with the fraud needs to stop.

00:28:50.000 And we need municipalities who are going to work with us to get more units built and get people back in homes in this country.

00:28:56.000 So how do you actually track sort of the...

00:28:59.000 The funds, right?

00:29:00.000 How do you track and audit all of this?

00:29:02.000 I mean, obviously, you know, it's trillions of dollars.

00:29:05.000 How do you conduct that oversight and get those mechanisms in place to make sure that it's done right and that, you know, as little as possible, you know, sort of slips by the wayside?

00:29:13.000 Well, first things first is we got to track it exactly like you're talking about.

00:29:17.000 It wasn't tracked from my perspective with the FHFA director.

00:29:20.000 Don, I showed up and I said to the team, I said, I want to see how much mortgage issuance we're doing every day.

00:29:25.000 Now, Don, we're doing like $750 million a day.

00:29:29.000 Two and a half billion dollars of mortgage issuance a day.

00:29:32.000 Think about that.

00:29:33.000 Those are crazy numbers.

00:29:35.000 Two and a half billion of mortgage issuance a day.

00:29:39.000 In some days, yes, correct.

00:29:40.000 Across all of our pipelines.

00:29:42.000 So my point being is, because it's a long story, but Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac actually own a company called Common Securitization Platform, which is this modern technology platform.

00:29:52.000 It's actually a very well-run business.

00:29:54.000 It's very valuable.

00:29:55.000 And we have all the pipes where all the mortgages run across our platform.

00:29:58.000 So I said to them, I said, I'm the director.

00:30:01.000 I said, I'm the conservator and the regulator.

00:30:03.000 I think I should be seeing, I think the director should know what the volume is.

00:30:07.000 And they looked at me like, you know.

00:30:08.000 I've never seen this before.

00:30:09.000 So, you know, but think about it like Ukraine, right?

00:30:12.000 Like, let's say we gave, I don't know, 200 billion to Ukraine or something like that.

00:30:16.000 Well, we're doing, you know, that in like 200 days at this agency and like nobody's watching it in my view.

00:30:23.000 So anyway, you know, I could get going on it, but we just got to start tracking it.

00:30:28.000 Then we're going to audit the right parts.

00:30:31.000 We're going to audit places where people don't want us to look.

00:30:34.000 So stay tuned.

00:30:35.000 We know we've only been in this for like seven weeks.

00:30:38.000 So, you know, Bill, obviously, you know, politics is cyclical and everything.

00:30:41.000 How do you make sure that whatever implementations you put in there actually last?

00:30:46.000 Because I think once the American people, a big part of all of this was the transparency, once American people see exactly what's going on in these places, it's a lot harder for them to say, hey, you know, there's a new president, let's just revert back to the old ways.

00:30:59.000 How do you codify some of this stuff so it stays in place after your tenure?

00:31:04.000 Oh, it's a great question.

00:31:06.000 It's like a lot of the other Trump policies.

00:31:07.000 How do we make sure that it stays intact, right?

00:31:09.000 Because you get these politicians like Biden, they came in, and in many ways, I think that they did some illegal stuff in terms of giving aid to people based on race or areas where they were only of a certain race.

00:31:21.000 So it's a great concern, Don.

00:31:23.000 I don't have an easy answer for you.

00:31:24.000 I would just say all I'm trying to do is find out where these illegalities are going on, where this mortgage fraud is going on.

00:31:32.000 Communicate it to the public, and hopefully they'll, you know, see what was really going on here.

00:31:37.000 You know, you saw Doge and USAID and stuff like that.

00:31:39.000 Our agency, because we oversee 7.8 trillion, you know, we just got to keep communicating with people so people can know how bad it was.

00:31:46.000 Never go back there.

00:31:47.000 I don't know.

00:31:48.000 I mean, do you have another idea?

00:31:50.000 I'd like to codify these things into law with Congress, or at least, you know, make it so transparent that if it ever slips back, people have a way of seeing it.

00:31:58.000 So they can say, no, no, no, no.

00:31:59.000 Enough is enough.

00:32:00.000 Because those are always the games.

00:32:01.000 It's like, oh, we're doing these things for all the right reasons and the media will back you.

00:32:04.000 And then you see all the right reasons.

00:32:06.000 You're like, wait, those aren't the right reasons.

00:32:07.000 Maybe they should be posting some of these numbers out there that I have access to as director, right?

00:32:14.000 And getting transparency out there.

00:32:16.000 So I have a lot of different ideas.

00:32:19.000 Give me a little bit more time on the job and we'll try to figure it out.

00:32:21.000 But yes, I agree.

00:32:22.000 Sunlight is the best disinfectant.

00:32:23.000 If we just get these numbers out there, a lot of people will audit these numbers and we won't have all this crime and grift that's going on in the mortgage market.

00:32:30.000 So you mentioned HUD earlier, housing and urban development.

00:32:33.000 That's going to be sort of, you know, demographically, you know, the lowest income tier in that.

00:32:39.000 You know, how big is that?

00:32:40.000 And then, you know, what are the different roles?

00:32:43.000 And how do they overlap so you can work together?

00:32:45.000 Because, again, I think we've got to create affordable housing or ability for people to get housing across all spectrums.

00:32:53.000 Obviously, your focus is probably going to be more middle class just because of the nature of where you're lending.

00:32:59.000 But I imagine that's trillions as well.

00:33:02.000 And there could probably be a lot of synergies to make this affordable for everyone.

00:33:05.000 Yeah, so interestingly, HUD is about a $74 billion agency.

00:33:10.000 So in terms of the numbers that we're talking about, you know, its annual budget is $74 billion.

00:33:14.000 They do have about a trillion at Ginnie Mae and FHA, which is essentially like government subsidized, government guaranteed version of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

00:33:24.000 So think about it in terms of, you know, we've got about $8 trillion.

00:33:29.000 They have about a trillion.

00:33:30.000 But what's interesting about HUD and us, To your point, you have different tiers of pricing in homes, but we together, along with the president, can say, hey, look, this is what we want to do in terms of housing supply.

00:33:45.000 This is what we want to do in terms of mortgage lending on some of the things that HUD controls.

00:33:50.000 For instance, HUD controls a certification called the HUD certification.

00:33:54.000 Novel name.

00:33:56.000 And basically, that's a...

00:33:57.000 Very, very important HUD certification.

00:33:59.000 You may know this from your days in construction.

00:34:02.000 If we can do that, give more HUD certification to these manufactured homes and provide a mortgage, right, you could see a boom in this housing market like we haven't seen in a long time.

00:34:12.000 Maybe ever, frankly.

00:34:14.000 So we're working intimately with HUD and with us.

00:34:16.000 And obviously, a lot of these decisions will ultimately be up to the president.

00:34:20.000 But I'm very convinced.

00:34:22.000 I'm very optimistic that the president will get this housing market booming again.

00:34:26.000 It's just we're going to need a little bit of time to reverse what's happened the last four years.

00:34:29.000 I mean, oh, yeah, no, you can't, you know, no one expects these things to change overnight.

00:34:34.000 We got four years to get it done and to get it done right.

00:34:36.000 So that's that's a really big deal.

00:34:38.000 And I'm glad you're working on it.

00:34:39.000 You know, we talked a little bit earlier.

00:34:40.000 You mentioned sort of.

00:34:41.000 China.

00:34:42.000 What about foreign ownership or foreign beneficiaries of these mortgages?

00:34:48.000 We've covered a lot about farmland in America and sort of the subversive ways Chinese government's trying to either buy up farmland for their food production at the expense of ours or around military bases. 0.86

00:35:01.000 Does that impact home ownership?

00:35:04.000 Are Chinese nationals or other people who aren't exactly allies, are they able to get Yes, it's a great question.

00:35:16.000 It's a very astute question, frankly.

00:35:19.000 And, you know, it's something that, and I got to be careful with what I say, but, you know, this morning I was actually looking at this, specifically the amount of foreign buying of mortgage-backed securities.

00:35:31.000 So without saying too much about what we have going on there, everything's fine.

00:35:35.000 But it's something that we need to keep a close eye on.

00:35:38.000 We are keeping a close eye on, both with the mortgage-backed securities as well as with regard to the land, the land that people are buying.

00:35:46.000 The mortgage-backed securities, Don, you know, these are good instruments.

00:35:49.000 People are – we've been underwriting since the crash in 2008 pretty good mortgages in this country.

00:35:54.000 And the Chinese, as well as some other – Areas are coming in and they're buying some of these mortgage-backed securities.

00:36:01.000 So, you know, I don't want to get too far out of my skis.

00:36:04.000 Some of this has to do with tariffs and stuff with the MBS purchases.

00:36:07.000 But, you know, we're looking at all of it and we want Americans buying American homes and we're doing everything we can to lower the cost after these last four years of devastation.

00:36:17.000 Yeah, I mean, talk about sort of, you said, you know, since 08, obviously, I think the world knows the world had sort of hit a wall, the banks were playing all sorts of games.

00:36:26.000 You know, I think a lot of people were upset there wasn't full accountability to that.

00:36:29.000 No one knew what was going on, but everyone sort of knew what they were going on with some of the, you know, the junk bonds or, you know, the subprime loans and lending.

00:36:38.000 Was that something that, you know, was also going on at HUD and sort of ignored?

00:36:42.000 You know, I know a lot of this stuff sort of...

00:36:44.000 Bush got blamed for a lot of that, but it really started under Clinton, where everyone should be in a million-dollar home.

00:36:49.000 It's like, well, that's wonderful, but if you're getting a million-dollar home and you're already extending yourself and you're doing so at all-time low interest rates, if anything changed, people were then very surprised they could no longer afford our mortgages.

00:37:00.000 What was going on at HUD, since I think people understand the story of what was going on in sort of the regular banking side?

00:37:05.000 Well, at HUD, it wasn't as prevalent as maybe it was at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

00:37:10.000 I mean, HUD definitely has it, but because we exist outside of HUD and because people were in charge of these two entities away from government control, they were able to get away with underwriting these loans, to your point, that almost blew up the entire economy, essentially almost did.

00:37:28.000 And so that's why they're in conservatorship now.

00:37:30.000 So I hope one day, you know, we can have a great company that does not have to be governed and in conservatorship.

00:37:36.000 And, you know, we're working hard to keep all of our options on the table.

00:37:39.000 But first things first is we can never have a mortgage market and under President, we can never have a mortgage market have that type of problem.

00:37:46.000 And under President Trump, we won't let that happen.

00:37:49.000 So, I mean, it feels like a part of that may be AI.

00:37:52.000 I know there's a new story about how you're actually using AI.

00:37:55.000 In the underwriting process.

00:37:57.000 What's the latest on that?

00:37:58.000 Because, you know, one of the things that I've, you know, sort of always voiced my frustrations for and I understood as a real estate guy, you know, we talked about points in and out and everything.

00:38:05.000 But, you know, you're literally paying points for someone to look at a piece of paper, pass it across the desk, title insurance or otherwise.

00:38:10.000 You know, what's the latest on the use of AI to streamline, to speed up some of these processes, you know, to carve out sort of these middlemen who are middlemen and maybe they're gainfully employed, but they don't really add any value in the process.

00:38:24.000 Correct.

00:38:26.000 Well, it's just rife with a lot of money to be made.

00:38:29.000 And why can't we pass that on to consumers?

00:38:31.000 You may have seen that we found a way where...

00:38:33.000 Lenders can pass on to up to $1,500 per loan.

00:38:37.000 That may not seem like a lot, but $1,500, as we all know, goes a long way.

00:38:41.000 So when I showed up on this job, Don, seven or eight weeks ago, that was one of the first things I asked.

00:38:46.000 And I was told specifically at Freddie Mac that some of our computer systems were based on the 1970s and 1980s.

00:38:53.000 And I'm sitting there thinking, in some ways, isn't this like a national security issue?

00:38:56.000 I mean, we've got $7 or $8 trillion that's on these rails that are built out of the 1970s and 1980s.

00:39:02.000 So, you know, I think you'll see us probably work with the Palantirs of the world and some other technology firms to try to figure out AI.

00:39:09.000 Maybe Elon's group will see.

00:39:11.000 I mean, I don't know if they have it, but, you know, anytime we can, you know, leverage people who are very bright.

00:39:16.000 And again, that's, you know, we're agnostic.

00:39:17.000 We don't care.

00:39:18.000 If somebody has great AI, whether it's OpenAI or Grok or Palantir, we'll look at it.

00:39:23.000 So more to come on that, but we're seven weeks in and we've launched one product and we're hoping to launch many more AI projects.

00:39:31.000 That's great.

00:39:32.000 I mean, I think that can streamline so much.

00:39:34.000 And so many of the things that I saw and was frustrated with as a real estate professional when that was my primary focus, that's a really big deal.

00:39:42.000 But we touched on it earlier.

00:39:44.000 We'll get to it.

00:39:45.000 Of course, the Pulte name, again, it's synonymous with home building.

00:39:49.000 How does your family's success and your business acumen shape your mission?

00:39:53.000 And drive your work to help everyday common sense Americans.

00:39:56.000 What do you remember about your upbringing and what you learned from your grandfather in that process?

00:40:02.000 Well, I was the only Pulte in Pulte Homes other than my grandfather.

00:40:05.000 And much like you with your father, you have a certain relationship with your father.

00:40:09.000 I have a certain relationship with my grandfather, which was amazing.

00:40:13.000 He'd be blown away, Don, that you're...

00:40:15.000 Dad appointed me to this job.

00:40:17.000 He'd be very impressed.

00:40:18.000 He'd be very proud.

00:40:19.000 You know, he developed essentially the modern day subdivision, if you want to know the truth in the country.

00:40:25.000 And so to see now his grandson, you know, in charge of this, he would be very happy.

00:40:30.000 And he'd just say, do a good job.

00:40:32.000 He used to call me Billy.

00:40:33.000 He'd say, Billy, do a good job.

00:40:34.000 Go get it done.

00:40:36.000 Get rid of the fraud.

00:40:37.000 Get rid of the, you know, throw these bad actors out and lower the cost and get people in the home.

00:40:44.000 Owning a home, Don, is owning an illiquid security that is one of the best assets that somebody can own.

00:40:51.000 And when people can't buy a home, they can't pass on that wealth to their kids and to their grandkids.

00:40:57.000 It's critical.

00:40:57.000 It's way more than a car, in my opinion.

00:40:59.000 It's way more than, in many ways, owning stocks or bonds.

00:41:02.000 Stocks and bonds are very important.

00:41:03.000 But owning a home, as you know better than anyone, is a generational gift.

00:41:08.000 And I'm grateful to my grandfather for giving me that opportunity.

00:41:11.000 And hopefully in this role, we can lower the cost and get people back in homes.

00:41:16.000 So what is the story of how Pulte Homes got started?

00:41:19.000 So my grandfather, his name was Bill Pulte as well.

00:41:21.000 He founded Pulte Homes in 1950 at age 18 in Detroit.

00:41:26.000 Classic American entrepreneur.

00:41:27.000 And today, Don, we've built over 800,000 homes, if you can believe that.

00:41:31.000 So from one home to over 800,000, I think that's the most of any builder in the country.

00:41:35.000 He basically built the country in many ways in terms of a subdivision.

00:41:40.000 I was very close with him.

00:41:42.000 It's funny, I was spending time with your father recently, and I called up my dad, who's a great guy.

00:41:47.000 And I said, Dad, I said, You know, the president reminds me so much of grandpa, you know, and it's just that work ethic.

00:41:53.000 It's just, you know, how to make things simple, the persistence.

00:41:58.000 You know, your father, my grandfather, they just had, you know, your dad wasn't a Depression-era guy, but just the resilience of the American.

00:42:04.000 Well, my grandfather was, so he sort of, he got it and understood.

00:42:08.000 He went through it.

00:42:09.000 And so, you know, we're also third generation in many ways.

00:42:11.000 My father did.

00:42:12.000 You know, something very different.

00:42:14.000 My father, my grandfather built sort of, you know, low and middle income, you know, rental apartments in Brooklyn and Queens.

00:42:20.000 You know, that was his thing.

00:42:21.000 And my father had a vision to take that to the next level and change the skyline of New York and, you know, build ultra luxury.

00:42:26.000 And so, you know, very different, but very similar.

00:42:29.000 Very similar.

00:42:30.000 Very similar.

00:42:30.000 And in fact, I've talked with your dad about Trump Homes, I believe they called it at one point, or your grandfather called it Trump Homes at one point when he was first starting out.

00:42:37.000 So the similarities are pretty amazing.

00:42:39.000 And, you know, just...

00:42:41.000 Just, my grandfather was a great guy, and he would be 93 now, and he just, you know, taught me so much.

00:42:50.000 But his persistence, he's just like your father.

00:42:52.000 You know, your dad, he just never gave up.

00:42:54.000 And your dad went through so much more than he did, but just never, ever give up.

00:42:58.000 And these two guys, and those depression era guys, they just don't make them like him anymore.

00:43:02.000 Now, I do have to ask this one.

00:43:05.000 I understand you may be limited in terms of what you can say about it because it's an ongoing investigation, but you started talking about rooting out the fraud from politicians or people who are able to manipulate these things.

00:43:16.000 I saw that you guys were the ones that found the potential Letitia James.

00:43:23.000 Fraud, the mortgage fraud, where she's the resident, so she got favorable interest rates.

00:43:27.000 She's married to her dad to get favorable interest rates. 0.98

00:43:31.000 She has the number of units slated different than what's actually on the certificate of occupancy so that you can get favorable interest rates.

00:43:40.000 I don't know if you can talk about that much, but I know I'd get killed if I didn't ask, because I know that originated from you guys, because some of those were loans from your organization.

00:43:48.000 Can you tell us what's going on there?

00:43:50.000 What's beyond?

00:43:51.000 And if you can't because it's an ongoing investigation, I also understand that.

00:43:56.000 But it seems like she was literally like it's par for the course for the Democrats.

00:44:01.000 She was literally doing all of the things that she accuses other people of doing and tried to jail and or bankrupt them for doing. 0.54

00:44:09.000 Well, I can't comment on any specific case, and I don't want to comment on that specific case.

00:44:14.000 My letter that I wrote to the DOJ, our letter, speaks for itself.

00:44:19.000 I want to say, however, just as a general matter, that Fannie Mae, we have $4.4 trillion.

00:44:24.000 We have another, let's call it $3.5 trillion at Freddie Mac.

00:44:28.000 We cannot have people of influence, people of prominent status, people of knowledge.

00:44:33.000 Or any person.

00:44:35.000 It doesn't matter whether you're somebody of knowledge or experience or fame or what have you.

00:44:39.000 If you commit mortgage fraud, we are going to come after you.

00:44:43.000 And that is irrespective of political party.

00:44:46.000 That is irrespective of everything.

00:44:48.000 If you commit mortgage fraud, we will come after you.

00:44:50.000 So I can't comment on the specific case.

00:44:52.000 I will just say that our agency is laser focused on it.

00:44:55.000 We've launched a tip line.

00:44:56.000 Fraud tips at FHFA.gov.

00:44:58.000 I encourage people to do it.

00:45:00.000 We're getting a lot of our tips from there.

00:45:02.000 And where we see fraud, we will say something.

00:45:05.000 So if people see something, say something.

00:45:07.000 Well, listen, I think that's so important.

00:45:10.000 And to use, perhaps, to use her famous line, no one is above the law.

00:45:17.000 It seems to me they say those things with great irony across the board in the Democrat Party, but no one's above the law.

00:45:25.000 And I'm glad you guys are checking it out.

00:45:26.000 Well, we'll check out any place where we see mortgage fraud.

00:45:30.000 We will continue to prosecute within the confines of our jurisdiction.

00:45:33.000 And we've got great partners at the FBI and DOJ.

00:45:36.000 And our agency, Don, I'll just leave you with this note.

00:45:39.000 We have a great inspector general, for example, and we have a great team at our main agency.

00:45:43.000 And over the years, FHFA has prosecuted and jailed many people for mortgage fraud and other things.

00:45:50.000 And it's absolutely critical because we can never have an 08 again.

00:45:54.000 People lying about their income.

00:45:56.000 Lying about where they live.

00:45:57.000 People saying that they live in one state, but really they live in another.

00:46:00.000 So again, I'm not commenting on a specific case.

00:46:02.000 Just as a general matter, we can't have this happen.

00:46:05.000 And certainly while I'm in charge and under President Trump, we are going to do everything we can to get rid of mortgage fraud.

00:46:11.000 Well, FHA Director Bill Pulte, thank you very much.

00:46:16.000 Keep up that great work and let's make housing affordable again. 0.59

00:46:19.000 Really appreciate it, man.

00:46:20.000 We're on it.

00:46:21.000 Thank you, Don.

00:46:22.000 Thank you.

00:46:23.000 Guys, thank you so much for tuning in.

00:46:26.000 Remember to like, to share, subscribe.

00:46:28.000 Just do it.

00:46:29.000 Hit the like button so you never miss one of these major episodes.

00:46:33.000 Subscribe, download the Rumble app on your smart TV so you can watch it with the family on the large screen.

00:46:40.000 I promise I behave myself the vast majority of the time so it can be a family-friendly show and they can learn about what's actually going on.

00:46:47.000 Be sure to check out our incredible sponsors down below and in the video description.

00:46:52.000 They allow this to happen even today, even in 2025.

00:46:56.000 That takes a lot of guts.

Triggered - Donald Trump Jr - May 22, 2025

House Rules: The Future of Fannie & Freddie, Plus Much More with Bill Pulte | TRIGGERED Ep.243

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