"They should be abolished," Frank said in an interview on Fox Business, when asked whether the mortgage giants should be elements in housing market reform. "They only question is what do you put in their place," Frank said.

The Federal Housing Administration should be fully self-financing and Freddie and Fannie should be replaced with a new mechanism to help subsidize housing, Frank said in the interview.

"There is no more hybrid private-public," the Massachusetts Democrat suggested. "If we want to subsidize housing then we could do it upfront and let the budget be clear about that."