BETHESDA, Md.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jul 6, 2026--
Walker & Dunlop, Inc. announced today that Frank Cassidy has rejoined the firm as a senior managing director following his tenure as commissioner of the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) and assistant secretary for housing at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Cassidy returns to Walker & Dunlop as the commercial real estate industry responds to evolving federal housing policies, persistent affordability challenges, and increasing demand for capital to expand the nation's housing supply.
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In his role, Cassidy will advise clients on FHA and Government-Sponsored Enterprise (GSE) financing strategies and work across the firm's platform to help owners, developers, lenders, and investors navigate a changing policy and capital markets environment.
"Frank returns to Walker & Dunlop at a defining moment in the housing industry," said Sheri Thompson, EVP, head of Affordable Housing at Walker & Dunlop. "Our country continues to face a significant housing shortage, and collaboration between the public and private sectors will be essential to delivering more affordable and workforce housing. Frank's leadership at HUD and deep understanding of FHA programs will be critical in helping clients navigate the evolving finance landscape.”
Cassidy joined HUD in April 2025. As FHA commissioner and assistant secretary for housing, he led HUD's housing policies, programs, and operations supporting homebuyers, renters, homeowners, and communities nationwide. He oversaw the FHA's approximately $2 trillion single-family, multifamily, and healthcare mortgage insurance portfolio, serving more than eight million homeowners, approximately 1.5 million renters, and nearly 4,000 healthcare facilities across the United States and its territories.
During his tenure, HUD reduced all FHA multifamily mortgage insurance premiums to the statutory minimum of 25 basis points, eliminated the Green Mortgage Insurance Premium category and related reporting requirements, simplified multifamily mortgage insurance programs, and launched the Section 232 Express Lane initiative, providing priority processing for eligible low-risk residential healthcare facility financing applications. Cassidy also oversaw HUD's Multifamily Assisted Housing Portfolio, serving more than 1.2 million low-income residents, along with the agency's housing counseling program and federal standards governing the design and construction of manufactured housing.
"Serving at HUD gave me the opportunity to help shape housing policy during an important period for our country’s history," Cassidy said. "I'm excited to return to Walker & Dunlop and work alongside our talented team to deliver the financing solutions our clients need to increase housing supply, improve affordability, and connect public policy with private capital."
Previously at Walker & Dunlop, Cassidy contributed to the growth of the firm's FHA lending platform, financing multifamily, affordable housing, seniors housing, and healthcare transactions across the country. His return further strengthens the firm's leadership in government-backed lending and reinforces its commitment to addressing one of the nation's most pressing economic challenges.
Walker & Dunlop is a leading HUD lender, ranked No. 5 based on MAP (Multifamily Accelerated Processing) and LEAN volume in 2025. Since its inception, the firm’s FHA/HUD platform has closed $45 billion across more than 2,000 transactions and continues to deliver consistent results, with a 99% approval rate since 2021. To learn more about our capabilities and financing solutions, visit our website.
About Walker & Dunlop
Walker & Dunlop (NYSE: WD) is one of the largest commercial real estate finance and advisory services firms in the United States and internationally. Our ideas and capital create communities where people live, work, shop, and play. Our innovative people, breadth of our brand, and our technological capabilities make us one of the most insightful and client-focused firms in the commercial real estate industry.
Frank Cassidy
NEW YORK (AP) — States across the country saw steep drops in the number of people covered by the Affordable Care Act over the past year, with Ohio and Oklahoma each losing nearly one-third of enrollees, according to new federal data that provides the first complete 50-state breakdown of sharp enrollment declines following the January expiration of enhanced subsidies.
The data, posted in late June by the Trump administration and first reported on by The Associated Press, reveals how changes in each state’s insured population led to around 2.6 million fewer Americans having Obamacare plans in February compared with the same time last year.
It captures not only how many people signed up for or were automatically reenrolled in plans in 2026, but how many paid their first monthly premiums to keep coverage, according to Cynthia Cox, a vice president and director of the ACA program at the healthcare research nonprofit KFF, who reviewed the dataset. She said it accounts for people who were retroactively removed from coverage after a nonpayment grace period ended.
“This is the first time we’ve seen state-level data that shows how much ACA marketplace enrollment truly fell,” Cox said. “It’s in line with our expectations, but it does show a very steep drop in the number of people with ACA coverage.”
Health analysts have kept a close eye on changes in ACA enrollment since the expiration of so-called enhanced premium tax credits caused many Americans’ monthly health insurance fees to double or triple, forcing some to forgo coverage entirely. The subsidies had been at the center of a bitter fight in Congress last fall, with Democrats and some Republicans calling for their renewal.
Health insurance costs have been rising across ACA and other health insurance programs at a time when voters in the approaching November elections say affordability is among their top concerns.
In a report released last week, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services suggested the significant drop in enrollment this year could be attributed to a federal crackdown on fraudulent or “phantom” enrollment. But analysts have said it was more likely related to the Jan. 1 expiration of federal subsidies, and other changes, including tightened requirements on which immigrants could access subsidized plans.
Mike Rhoads, deputy commissioner of life and health at the Oklahoma Insurance Department, cited a crackdown on fraudulent enrollments as one reason ACA enrollments dropped. But he said in his state, the biggest factor was money.
“It's all about affordability at this point in time,” he said in an interview, adding that he expects the problem to continue with insurers forecast to raise rates again next year.
An AP analysis of the data finds that Ohio and Oklahoma each saw a more than 32% decline in ACA enrollment over the past year. They lost larger shares of their covered populations than any other state.
Following closely behind, and losing more than a fourth of their enrollees, were Arizona, South Carolina, Minnesota, Indiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Louisiana and Missouri.
Florida, a state that relies highly on ACA insurance in part because it did not expand Medicaid and is home to many gig workers and entrepreneurs, still has more residents in the marketplace than any other state, at nearly 4 million. But it also saw the highest number of enrollees drop coverage this year — around 443,000.
The data doesn’t show whether people who dropped ACA health insurance this year found coverage elsewhere, and chances are some of them became insured through employer plans or other options. But Cox said most people who left the marketplace are likely going without insurance, because it is typically a “place of last resort” to get health coverage for people who aren’t eligible elsewhere.
Some of the states that saw the largest enrollment declines were the same ones that saw the biggest enrollment gains after the federal government introduced enhanced subsidies during the COVID-19 pandemic. Cox said that isn’t surprising, because those states likely had large numbers of people who enrolled only because the enhanced subsidies made coverage much more affordable.
Only one state saw an increase in its covered population. New Mexico gained some 14% more enrollees in the government health insurance program compared with the same time last year. It was the only state in the nation that fully replaced the lost federal subsidies using its own funds.
About three in five states use the federal marketplace Healthcare.gov, while the rest operate their own state-based marketplaces for ACA insurance.
The new data shows that federal marketplace states overall lost larger shares of enrollees than states with state-based exchanges.
One reason for that could be that many states with their own marketplaces took steps to offset costs for their residents when the enhanced subsidies expired in January.
New Mexico, which saw double-digit enrollment gains, is the most extreme example of that. In a special legislative session last fall, lawmakers in the state approved a plan to use state funds to make up for the missing subsidies through mid-2026. In March, the state’s governor signed a bill to continue making up the difference through mid-2027.
Tim Fowler, public relations coordinator for the New Mexico Health Care Authority, said the state's rise in enrollment was due to its healthcare affordability fund that replaced the subsidies.
“In New Mexico, we believe health insurance should protect people against medical debt, not cause it,” he said.
FILE - Insurance agent Maria Collado, center right, works with clients at a shopping mall kiosk run by Las Madrinas de los Seguros, Spanish for "The Godmothers of Insurance," at a shopping center in Miami, Dec. 5, 2023. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell, File)
FILE - The healthcare.gov website is seen on Dec. 14, 2021, in Fort Washington, Md. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)
