WASHINGTON, DC-Lenders such as Bank of America, GMAC, Wells Fargo and
 Citigroup may be insisting that their foreclosure practices and procedures complied with the law, but there has been enough doubt
about that issue that the government is apparently investigating.

The investigation, still in its early days as the Washington Post reports,
has sent shudders throughout the mortgage and real estate industry,
which had been hoping to have seen the worst of the crisis past.
 However, comments made by Housing and Urban Development secretary Shaun 
Donovan to Bloomberg News 
on Wednesday suggest the investigation’s reach may be limited.

As to whether lenders have been foreclosing on homeowners with
in accurate or illegal documents, he said there is no evidence of
 systematic wrong doing.
 Instead, he emphasized other areas of inquiry, namely whether lenders
 have been complying with FHA regulations as to loan modifications.

Donovan made his comments after a meeting with the members of
 President Obama's Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force, the
 intra-agency group that has been spearheading the investigation.

Donovan also said the
 group is coordinating with state attorneys general on these issues. The Obama Administration has made clear, in one manner or another ,
that it does not want to see a moratorium on foreclosures for fear 
that the achingly slow housing recovery will come to a halt. That,
 however, is not so much of a concern for the attorneys general that are investigating the issue.