(Reuters) -President Donald Trump on Sunday urged U.S. mortgage financing companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to "get Big Homebuilders going," saying without providing evidence that U.S. builders were "sitting on 2 Million empty lots, a RECORD."

It was unclear exactly what action Trump expected builders or the mortgage giants to take. Trump met in August with top U.S. bank executives to discuss his administration's plans to privatize the finance firms, which guarantee over half the nation's mortgages and have been under federal conservatorship since the 2008 financial crisis.