No income, no asset

No income, no asset (NINA) is a term used in the United States mortgage industry to describe one of many documentation types which lenders may allow when underwriting a mortgage. A loan issued under such circumstances may be referred to as a NINA loan or NINJA loan.

NINA programs are ostensibly created for those with hard to verify incomes (waiters, etc.) but in actuality have been popularly used in situations where aggressive mortgage lenders and brokers did not want any trouble qualifying otherwise non-qualifying loans, thus becoming a significant factor in the subprime lending crisis. A significant number of NINA loans were never possible for the applicant to repay and have resulted in defaults for this reason, as laid out in detail by investigative reporters, including the reporting of ''This American Life'' and ''Planet Money'' that culminated in the Peabody- and Polk- award winning episode "The Giant Pool of Money." Provided by Wikipedia