The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has released a final rule based on an earlier proposed amendment to the new mandatory escrow rules applying to higher-priced mortgage loans (HPMLs), which are set to go into effect on June 1. In addition to finalizing the proposed amendment, this rule also fixes a problem with the previous version of the rule, which erroneously removed the ability-to-repay and prepayment penalty requirements that apply to HPMLs. The amendment ensures that the existing HPML requirements stay in effect until the new requirements in a separate rule go into effect on January 10, 2014. The amendment also clarifies the qualifications for the exemption of rural and underserved counties from the mandatory escrow rule (the CFPB's list of these counties remains unchanged for now, but a new list will be released in 2014).