Rams Home Loans Group yesterday provided a somewhat frank and also somewhat surprising appraisal of its progress, if that's the right word, in seeking alternative funding for the mountain of short-term debt that needs refinancing in a hurry.In one section of its release to the Australian Stock Exchange Rams owned up to the obvious: it has no options and no prospects of refinancing in any offshore market and its options in the Australian bond market are so slight as to be irrelevant.Of the $6 billion in debt now funded through two extendible commercial paper programs in the US market and due for repayment on February 11 2008 Rams said negotiations "are in process and at various stages of the approval process".Rams also said that it was "confident that at least one of the two XCP programs will be refinanced".Those approvals in train have to be from the two banks that are stuck, as the "market value providers", in wearing the credit risk of these portfolios anyway.These banks are ABN Amro and National Australia Bank under the two separate XCP programs refreshed by Rams in 2006 and 2007. In the past the two XCP funding programs have been described as being for $3 billion each though News Limited newspapers put those programs at $2.7 billion in the program for which NAB is the market value provider and $3.3 billion for the program for which ABN is the backstop source of funding.Rams said that so far it had extended all warehouse facilities as they fell due and that it expected the same on other warehouses as they fall due.It's not as if the existing warehouse lenders to Rams have any option, since no other funder is about to take over those loans. It's a stand-by in the banking business: roll over dud loans and call them performing.