A new government report shows many seniors are taking out reverse mortgages on their homes without fully understanding the ramifications, leading to foreclosures among borrowers and a tangle of problems for heirs after the borrower dies.

"Consumer complaints tell us that the complex terms of reverse mortgages continue to be misunderstood," said Richard Cordray, director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which released a report highlighting the top complaints the agency received about reverse mortgages over the last three years.

A reverse mortgage is a type of loan that allows homeowners age 62 and older to tap a portion of the equity in their homes. The money typically is paid out in a lump sum or in regular fixed payments, with fees and interest added to the balance each month. Unlike a home equity loan, the money does not have to be repaid until the borrower dies, moves out or sells the home.

The loans can be a life line for house-rich, cash-poor seniors struggling with daily living expenses. Reverse mortgages also have been used to help retirees improve their lifestyles, allowing them to buy the summer home they had always dreamed about, for example.

But problems and confusion are expected to continue as more baby boomers retiring with little or no savings turn to the loans for help getting by.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau cited a 2010 Federal Reserve report concluding that in the 55-64 age group, 41 percent had no retirement savings.

Many complaints that the protection bureau received showed people were confused about the way reverse mortgages work.

"Many consumers struggle with understanding how quickly their loan balance will go up and their home equity will fall," the report said. As a result, many borrowers who wanted to refinance their loans were frustrated because there wasn't enough remaining equity in their homes.

One of the most common types of complaints involved the inability of a borrower's family members to assume the loan in order to keep the house when the borrower died, according to the report.

Reverse mortgages prohibit loan assumptions because actuarial tables are used to help determine the loan amounts. Adult children may keep the home only by paying off the loan or by paying 95 percent of the current appraised value of the house.

Those rules can present problems for multigenerational households when family members are living in the home at the time of the borrower's death.

Heirs also complained about what they believed were inflated appraisals that required them to pay more than they expected, the report said.

Another common complaint involved the shock of having to sell a home or face foreclosure when a spouse died because the surviving spouse's name was not on the reverse mortgage.