1. The Equity REIT: This is similar to a mutual fund except the investors own an interest in whatever real estate the organization acquires. The form of ownership is like a corporation. The equity REIT is a major buyer of office buildings, shopping centers, and the like. It takes part in joint ventures, develops, builds.

2. The Mortgage REIT. This form of real estate trust is designed for lending. They vary in size but are potentially in the lending game. They got into trouble in the early 1970s by being overly zealous with their lending practices. Many of their loans went bad, and they ended up owning property through foreclosures.

3. The Hybrid REIT: This is a mixture of the two earlier forms of REITs.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency, which took over the tottering government-sponsored enterprises in September, announced the plan at a news conference on Tuesday, in conjunction with Hope Now, an alliance of private mortgage companies. A majority of its members, which include several dozen major lenders and loan servicers, are voluntarily participating in the program.

Its considered more far-reaching than previous loan-workout efforts because Fannie and Freddie own or guarantee about 58 percent of nations single-family home loans and often set the standards followed throughout the industry.

They hold more than half the mortgages in the country, so they can make a real dent in the foreclosure process, said Ken Rosen, chairman of the Fisher Center for Real Estate and Urban Economics at UC Berkeley. This sounds like a very good attempt to set broad guidelines. Hopefully well see other holders of mortgages adopting (them).

Some, however, feel the Streamlined Modification Plan wont do enough to help distressed borrowers, particularly those caught in the sort of subprime or large loans that Fannie and Freddie dont buy or back. This is a step in the right direction but falls short of what is needed to achieve wide-scale modifications of distressed mortgages, Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chairman Sheila Bair said in a statement.

More help was promised Tuesday to hundreds of thousands of homeowners who have fallen behind on mortgage payments and are at risk of foreclosure: The government said it will fast-track certain loan modifications, while mortgage giant Citigroup announced its own program.

In all, efforts by the government and lenders to help people in over their heads are targeting as many as 1 million households as the financial crisis intensifies, but a potentially bigger government bailout for homeowners is still under discussion.

The new programs are being formulated as it has become painfully obvious that earlier government-led foreclosure prevention efforts were only mildly successful, as lenders and servicers didnt rush to participate in voluntary programs that were cumbersome to administrate.

Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Treasury Department, along with a consortium of participating mortgage lenders, investors and servicers, said Tuesday their program would reduce monthly payments and potentially help hundreds of thousands of homeowners who have fallen at least 90 days behind in their payments.

3A%2F%2F1.gravatar.com%2Favatar%2Fad516503a11cd5ca435acc9bb6523536%3Fs%3D60&r=G /%