BOISE - Recent changes to the Idaho Housing and Finance Association Web site, www.ihfa.org, highlight the free Finally Home!® Home Buyer Education program and information, available at www.ihfa.org/homebuyer_homebuyered.asp.

The Finally Home!® course has proven to be extremely helpful to potential home buyers. In the eight-hour classes, offered free of charge, buyers are guided through the terminology and paperwork of a mortgage transaction and much more. More than 200 free Finally Home!® classes are now offered around the state each year.

Classes also are offered in Spanish and may soon be offered online as well. Nearly 2,300 people graduated from the program last year, and more than 7,500 have graduated since it started in 1999.

At the new site www.ihfa.org/homebuyer_homebuyered.asp an overview of the nonprofit program is available, and prospective home buyers can access class information such as the time, date and location of courses, which are offered in every population center in the state through eight Regional Training Partners. The new Home Buyer Education site also features members and sponsors and an area for tax-deductible online contributions to the program.

"In the class we touch on credit issues, home maintenance, inspections, predatory lending, identity theft and wise use of home equity," says Sue Pisani, IHFA Statewide Home Buyer Education administrator. "We have great instructors-lenders, Realtors ®, home inspectors, escrow officers, credit counselors, insurance people."

"If we hear one complaint, it is that people who come to the class wish they had done it sooner, before they even started the home-buying process," says Carolyn Ernst, a Caldwell Realtor ® who serves as administrator and coordinator for IHFA's Finally Home! ® classes in Canyon County.

The program also significantly reduces the risk of foreclosure. A Federal Mortgage Assurance Corporation ("Freddie Mac") study of 40,000 loans made between 1993 and 2000 shows that home buyers who spend a few hours in a home buyer education class before making their loan deal are 26 percent less likely to become delinquent on their mortgage payments than buyers who don't participate. Program graduates also are eligible to receive a down-payment and closing-cost assistance. A qualified graduate also may be eligible to use "gifted funds" at the time of closing, could qualify for lower mortgage insurance premiums, and may be able to participate in programs that accept higher debt ratios.

More than 50 organizations across the state have endorsed the idea of financial literacy for Idaho's citizens by becoming members or financial sponsors of Finally Home!® as recognition of the program's rewards has grown. These organizations are partnering with other industry professionals to support low- and moderate-income home buyers, open the doors for minority home ownership, help reduce the risk of foreclosure, and work to create better communities.

The original mission for Finally Home!® is still the same-to help potential home buyers with the many decisions they face in becoming new home owners. The new Home Buyer Education Web site link at www.ihfa.org/homebuyer_homebuyered.asp is another step in that direction.