Jan 8, 2012
Troubled mortgages hit record high
From cnnmoney.com:
Despite all the hand-wringing and attempts to contain the foreclosure plague, the problem still spread during the first three months of 2009, as the number of foreclosure actions started hit a record high, according to a quarterly report.
The National Delinquency Survey released Thursday by the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA), reported the largest quarter-over-quarter increase in foreclosure starts since it began keeping records in 1972. Lenders initiated foreclosures on 1.37% of all first mortgages during the quarter, a 27% increase from the 1.08% rate during the last three months of 2008 and a 36% rise from the first quarter of 2008. All told, more than 616,000 mortgages were hit with foreclosure actions.
Delinquencies, the stage in which borrowers have fallen behind on payments but have not yet reached the point where they’ve received intent-to-foreclose notices, also hit record highs, with the seasonally adjusted rate at 9.12% of all loans, up from 7.88% last quarter.
The ugly report was sobering but not unexpected, according to Jay Brinkmann, MBA’s chief economist. He pointed out that foreclosure rates had grown little during the previous three quarters, even as the number of homeowners falling behind on mortgage payments continued to soar.
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