The making home affordable program introduced by the Obama administration set standard guidelines and eligibility requirements aimed at saving millions of home owners from the clutches of foreclosure. The making home affordable program is funded by $75 billion and it offers a unique way to modify the structure of the mortgage loan to make it more affordable on a monthly basis. Since the home owners applying for the making home affordable program are already short on cash that is why the federal making home affordable program makes the mortgage loan extremely affordable. The two sub-parts of the making home affordable program namely home affordable refinance program and home affordable modification program are voluntary programs that can be adopted by the banks and lending institutions at their own will. However, incentives offered by the government make it a more attractive scheme and the stimulus of incentives makes most of the lenders avail it.

To qualify for the home affordable modification program or the home affordable refinance program the eligibility criteria for the programs as set by the making home affordable program guidelines are as follows:

- The home on which the mortgage has been taken should be a primary residence.
- The original mortgage loan should have originated prior to 1st January, 2009.
- The loan amount to be repaid on a monthly basis should be less than @729,750 for a unit.
- The mortgage loan repayment amount should exceed 31% of the total gross income of the homeowner.

Qualifying for the federal making home affordable program is easy if an individual knows the criterion's and makes an effort to establish a good application for securing an approval on the making home affordable program. The home affordable modification program can help a homeowner reduce the monthly mortgage payment to as low as 2% or extend the term period of repayment to up to 40 years. There are certain times when a certain part of the principal outstanding amount is also waived off to accommodate the needs of the homeowner who is falling short of cash to meet up to the mortgage loan repayment requirements.

Lenders such as Bank of America, Chase Financial, CitiMortgage and many others are already a part of the federal making home affordable program and there are other large banks in the queue awaiting approval on the program. A formal agreement with the Treasury department seals the program for the banks and adopt it formally.