UPDATE 3-US Congress approves housing bill, sends to Bush

(Adds White House statement)

By Kevin Drawbaugh

WASHINGTON, July 26 (Reuters) - The U.S. Congress approved a massive housing market rescue bill on Saturday, offering emergency financing to mortgage titans Fannie Mae (FNM.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and Freddie Mac (FRE.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), and setting up a $300-billion fund to help hundreds of thousands of troubled homeowners.

Approved by the Senate in a 72-13 vote, the election-year rescue bill was passed by the House of Representatives on Wednesday. President George W. Bush was expected to sign it promptly, amid doubts about how much it would help.

With foreclosures at record levels, home sales sluggish and property values down, America is in its deepest housing slump since the Great Depression.

Fears that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the largest U.S. mortgage companies, might collapse rattled global markets earlier this month and led the Bush administration to call for emergency measures to bolster investor confidence.

They recently lost billions of dollars on bad home loans and the stock market has whipsawed their share prices on uncertainty about whether they have enough capital.

Housing activists and scholars said this election-year bill will ease, but not end, the housing crisis.

"We have a housing market going into cardiac arrest. This bill is like CPR to stabilize the situation," said David Abromowitz, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, a think tank in Washington.