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Fund’s home loan program for sale
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Posted on Jan 26 2012
The NMI Retirement Fund is selling its member home loan program after its board of trustees approved yesterday the issuance of a request for proposal.
Board chair Sixto K. Igisomar told Saipan Tribune that selling the program will allow the Fund to concentrate on the pension plan.
Other programs under the agency such as the Workers Compensation Commission and the Group Health Life Insurance Program are also being considered for transfer to other agencies, Igisomar said.
Bills now pending at the Legislature propose to transfer WCC to the Commerce Department and the GHLIP to either the Office of Management and Budget or Office of Personnel Management.
Fund records show that there are 106 loans under the program; 31 are considered bad loans or delinquents. Of these bad loans, only two can be potentially collected while the rest are classified as “dead accounts.”
“I know there are some differences in opinion among members and trustees in the past and even now…and I understand that…but you just don’t wait until you have 80-percent delinquency when nobody wants to buy it anymore,” Igisomar said. He believes that selling the program now is “something that we need to do” at this time.
The Fund has a total investment of $5.5 million in the program. As of December 2010, bad loans amounted to nearly $800,000.
