The federak home loan bank system

Revival of the capital industries is increasingly heralded as the solutin to depres sion difficulties. Small-home construetion, repairs, and mortgage financing offer ex tensive opportunities for stimulating capital industries and simultaneously assisting distressed home owners and mortgage creditors. Already functioning are the various agencies embraced in the Federal Home Loan Bank System, whose enlarged legisla tive powers and expanding operations merit attention. (1) Originally the only part of the System, the twelve regional Home Loan Banks have operated impressively in lend ing to approved home-finance banks and associations on the security of their mortgage assets. (2) An offspring of the System, and subject to it, is the Home Owners' Loan Corporation (HOLC), dealing directly with the public and salvaging existing mort gages largely through the exchange of its own bonds guaranteed by the United States government. These bonds have been an interesting feature of the investment market (8) Another branch of the System, the Federal Savings and Loan Association, as sisted by federal government funds, operates in local areas as thrift and lending organizations. (4) Finally, the last Congress added to the System a Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation to insure the accounts of building and loan and savings institutions. The entire System, in both its emergency and permanent agencies, constitutes an important addition to the mechanism of home-finance.