A General Services Administration website that FHA lenders must check before approving loans crashed Monday and has been down most of the week, delaying mortgage closings, National Mortgage News has learned.
The Federal Housing Administration requires lenders to check GSA’s website to make sure the borrower, their real estate agent or the loan officer has not been barred from doing business with the federal government.
The website crashed after GSA replaced its ‘Excluded Parties List’ system with a new system called SAM.
“This has caused panic with lenders who have been unable to check names against the debarment list and is now beginning to delay closings,” said Bud Carter, a consultant with Potomac Partners.
“No one seems to be able to contact GSA to get answers to what's going on with this new GSA system,” he added.
But late Friday a spokesperson for GSA insisted the SAM website wasn’t down and instead is just running very slowly. But GSA will be working with IBM closely over the weekend to get the issue resolved by Monday.
FHA officials are aware of the problem, a HUD spokesman said. “We understand that GSA has recently consolidated some systems and that may be causing some issues. GSA should be contacted about alternatives to access this information while those systems are down,” the spokesman said.
