Ray and Becky Queen live in rural Oklahoma with their kids (and chickens). The Queens were able to buy that home with a VA loan because of Ray's service in the Army. During COVID, the Queens – like millions of other Americans – needed help from emergency forbearance. They were told they could pause home payments for up to a year and then pick up again making affordable mortgage payments with no problems.That's what happened for most American homeowners who took forbearance. But not for tens of thousands of military veterans like Ray Queen.On today's show, we follow two reporters' journey to figure out what went wrong with the VA's loan forbearance program. How did something meant to help vets keep their houses during COVID end up stranding tens of thousands of them on the brink of foreclosure? And, once the error was spotted, did the government do enough to make things right?Today's episode was produced by James Sneed. It was edited by Meg Cramer. And fact-checked by Dania Suleman. Engineering by Cena Loffredo. Alex Goldmark is Planet Money's executive producer.Help support Planet Money and hear our bonus episodes by subscribing to Planet Money+ in Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org/planetmoney.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy
Full Episode
Hey, it's Kenny Malone. for an NPR Politics podcast episode dropping a few hours after that kind of thing. And then finally, there is Consider This. That is the podcast where NPR covers one big story in depth every weekday evening. So up first in the morning, Consider This in the evening, and the NPR Politics podcast anytime big stuff happens.
It's an around-the-clock election news survival kit from NPR podcasts. Okay, thank you for listening. Here's the show.
This is Planet Money from NPR.
It's gorgeous farmland out here.
Yeah, it's nice.
Picture a Jeep bouncing along a dirt road in rural Oklahoma.
Is that their house? What does it say? It's on the right or the left? I think it's on the left.
These are two of my colleagues, NPR reporters Quill Lawrence and Chris Arnold, and they're pulling up to a house.
Is that right? I think that's right, yeah.
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