The number of mortgage loans going bad outpaces the number of loans being modified through mortgage-relief efforts.
That’s bad news for the housing market.
The Lender Processing Services group’s Mortgage Monitor shows that the number of loans that are delinquent or in the process of being foreclosed totals 7.5 million, CNBC reports.
Loans that were current as of Jan. 1, 2009, but turned 60 days or more delinquent as of Jan. 1, 2010, totaled 2.5 million.
That 2.5 million figures compares to the 2 million mortgages that have been modified through relief efforts including the government’s ballyhooed Home Affordable Modification Program.
So loans are going bad at a 25 percent faster pace than they’re being fixed.
In addition, the lender group report says that the modification is causing the mortgage resolution process to slow down, so that problem loans are growing and stagnating.
Of loans that have been delinquent for at least six months, 31 percent aren’t yet in foreclosure. And that’s also true for 22.8 percent of loans delinquent for at least 12 months, the report says.
Experts have mixed views on the housing sector now, with some viewing the glass as half empty and others as half full.
The Federal Reserve, in its latest statement on interest rates, wrote “housing starts have been flat at a depressed level.”
It also notes that consumer spending is still constrained by “lower housing wealth.”
© 2012 Thomson/Reuters. All rights reserved.