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Freddie Mac helps borrowers through foreclosure crisisMortgagePress.comsub-prime borrowers, educate and advise borrowers, obtain workouts Deploys $10.5 million in grants Freddie Mac announced $10.5 million in grants to housing counseling organizations to use for their outreach, education and foreclosure prevention efforts to help borrowers. The grants will enable the non-profit organizations to add and train staff, pay operational expenses, and support outreach campaigns to borrowers having difficulty making their mortgage payments, especially sub-prime borrowers. The organizations were selected for their abilities to educate and advise borrowers about their foreclosure options and/or help them obtain workouts from their mortgage servicers. The largest share of the funds will be administered through the Enterprise Community Partners, NeighborWorks America, the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments and HomeFree USA. "Although the challenges facing today's housing market go beyond any one company's ability to resolve, Freddie Mac is working with the non-profit organizations, which are in the trenches, to make a real difference for many of America's borrowers," said Richard F. Syron, CEO and chairman of Freddie Mac. "By putting another piece of that plan into place, [this] announcement underscores how Freddie Mac's mission to expand homeownership includes helping delinquent borrowers avoid foreclosure whenever possible." The $10.5 million in funding disbursements is the result of the November settlement between the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight and former Freddie Mac CEO Leland Brendsel. The announcement builds on Freddie Mac's efforts to help distressed borrowers by fostering mortgage workouts that enable them to avoid foreclosure. Last year, because of Freddie Mac and the mortgage servicers it works with, almost 50,000 families that had run into financial trouble were able to keep their homes. Freddie Mac currently is working out roughly 1,000 loans per week, where 90 percent of the affected families keep their homes. For more information, visit www.freddiemac.com.