The new guidelines make the program more flexible in hopes of attracting more qualified distressed owners to voluntarily agree to a Short Sale of Deed-in-Lieu (DIL) of foreclosure. The expanded program should provide new options to those who have been rejected from loan modification programs.
CoreLogic reported that residential repossessions and properties nearing repossession decreased in January 2011 from 2 million to 1.8 million units. Because home sales have slowed in recent months the drop in units will still take about the same amount of time to clear, estimated by CoreLogic at 9 months.
There have been relatively few reports on the discussions between the Attorneys General team and representatives of the servicers about the terms of a settlement over the robo-signing issues. A meeting was held on March 30 in what was expected to be the first of many sessions. Most of the 50 Attorneys General representatives are standing firm on the settlement terms that were proposed earlier in March, while most servicers maintain that the settlement terms are too harsh.
The Federal Housing Finance Agency has announced a one year extension on the Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP) until June 30, 2012. The program which was begun in March 2009 allows homeowners to refinance out of negative equity into lower fixed interest rates. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will allow HARP refinancing to be exempt from recently announced price adjustments.
The Attorneys General of several states have sent a letter to Iowa AG, Tom Miller, who is spearheading the effort to review wrong-doing in the robo-signing controversy protesting that forced loan assistance is “largely unrelated to the foreclosure document issue.” The AGs concerned about the linking of assistance remedies with those having to do with documentation procedures are all Republicans from the states of Virginia, Texas, Florida and South Carolina.
Mortgage Daily noted in its latest quarterly report that mortgage litigation is up around 42% in the 4th quarter of 2010 compared to the previous quarter. Lawsuits over loan modifications tripled in Q4. Investor lawsuits doubled. Given the lack of agreement on whether the mortgage industry has really resolved the foreclosure documentation crisis the wave [...]
Since its inception, HAMP has helped only half a million homeowners. That is only 1/6 of the three to four million distressed homeowners that the program promised to keep out of foreclosure when it was being created. Despite its under-performance, Administration officials have advised President Obama that HAMP should be retained. Obama for his part [...]
Bank of America researchers recently completed a survey of homeowners who are 60 days or more delinquent in paying their mortgages and concluded that only 14% of these homeowners would be eligible for a HAMP loan modification under the current rules.
Heavy fines and the notion of requiring massive numbers of principal reductions are causing lenders to push back against the proposed foreclosure documentation error punishments.
CoreLogic has estimated that there slightly over 11 million home mortgages that are under water as of the fourth quarter of 2010. The under water mortgage number is 3% ahead of the 3rd quarter of 2010 and represents about 23.1% of all U.S. homes.