HOPE NOW: February Loan Mods Unchanged

HOPE NOW reported 97,000 mortgage actions for homeowners in February, while foreclosure actions ticked up slightly.

HOPE NOW, of which the Mortgage Bankers Association is a founding member, reported non-foreclosure actions outpaced foreclosure sales by a 3-1 margin, but noted that both foreclosure starts and foreclosure completions increased from January.

For February, total non-foreclosure actions (the combination of total loan modifications, short sales, deeds in lieu and workout plans) totaled 97,000, compared to 28,000 foreclosure sales. This included 27,000 permanent loan modifications under both proprietary programs and the government’s Home Affordable Modification Program.

Since HOPE NOW began reporting data in 2007, non-foreclosure actions totaled 24.8 million; permanent loan modifications totaled 7.8 million.

“Non-foreclosure solutions outpaced foreclosure sales by more than a three to one margin in the month of February,” said HOPE NOW Executive Director Erik Selk. “This has been a fairly steady trend for the past year and illustrates the availability of various long term and short term solutions that benefit homeowners. From a historical perspective, this number marks consistent performance in customer assistance and solutions offered.”

Other report metrics:
–Loan Modifications: 27,000 completed in February, unchanged from January.
–Short sales: 5,300 completed in February vs. 5,800 in January, a decrease of 8%.
–Deed in-lieu: 1,600 completed in February vs. 1,700 in January, a decrease of 4%.
–Foreclosure starts: 62,000 in February vs. 58,000 in January, an increase of 7%.
–Foreclosure sales: 28,000 in February vs. 33,000 in January, a decrease of 15%.
–Serious delinquencies: 1.64 million in February vs. 1.84 million in January, a decrease of 11%.

The full data set for February 2016 is available at www.hopenow.com.