Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac posted their 2004 conforming loan limit as $333,700, or 3.4% higher than the 2003 limit of $322,700.

This press release further mentioned "[b]y obtaining a mortgage that Fannie Mae is eligible to buy, in 2004, as many as 95,000 home buyers could save up to $21,900 over the life of a 30-year mortgage."

But this is misleading. The net benefit to those affectd families is the interest rate difference between the first mortgage and second mortgage, which, in this case, should be home equity loan for apple-to-apple comparison. The spread between those two types of loans is usually less than 1%, and to compound that with the $11,000 difference ($333,700 - $322,700), the benefit is around $110/year or $3,300 over 30-year span. This does not even consider the tax benefit for mortgage interest, which applies to second mortgage as well.

Of course, one can claim the $21,900 number is an as-much-as number, but this high-end benefit number only applies to those uneconomically roll the additional $11,000 to the first mortgage to make it non-conforming (around 0.5% interest rate difference applies to the entire mortgage), then apply for private mortgage insurance (PMI) for this $11,000 amount difference (up to $100/month for 4-5 years).To avoid misleading, Fannie Mae should quantify a reasonable average benefit amount instead of putting this outrageous claim into the release.