Tag Archives: Loan Modification

The number of homeowners who received permanent, affordable proprietary loan modifications jumped up 43 percent from June to July, HOPE NOW reported Wednesday. The voluntary, private sector alliance of mortgage professionals and non-profit counselors released its July 2012 loan modification data, revealing that an estimated 66,002 homeowners received proprietary loan modifications in July, an increase from 46,208 in June.

Five months after the nation's top five servicers settled with the states attorneys general and several federal agencies to address iniquities in foreclosure processes, Joseph A. Smith, Jr., the settlement monitor, released a preliminary report to inform the public of the servicers' progress so far. Thus far, the five servicers - Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, and Ally Financial - offered $10.56 billion in relief to borrowers and have implemented between 35 and 72 percent of the 304 servicing standards detailed in the national settlement.

Homeowners and officials in held a town meeting Thursday in Akron, Ohio, to discuss the impact of the housing crisis on their communities. The event, called #MyHomeMyVote, was designed to put the housing crisis and voters' concerns at the forefront of the wave of issues surrounding this year's election season.

Massachusetts attorney general Martha Coakley issued a letter Thursday to Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and their conservator, FHFA, reminding the agency and mortgage giants that they are required to offer reasonable loan modifications in the state and urging flexibility on principal reductions. In a letter addressed to FHFA acting director Edward DeMarco, Coakley outlines a law recently passed in Massachusetts that requires creditors to ""make commercially reasonable efforts to achieve a commercially reasonable loan modification.""

Arizona attorney general Tom Horne announced the filing of two lawsuits against Arizona companies offering allegedly fraudulent mortgage modification services to distressed homeowners. Horne brought suits against Phoenix-based Making All Homes Affordable, LLC (MAHA) and Tucson-based La Paz Source, LLC, alleging fraudulent practices by the two companies.

The California Department of Real Estate (DRE) issued a Consumer Alert warning Spanish-speaking consumers about scammers who specifically target non-English speaking Latino homeowners.

For Wells Fargo customers facing financial hardships, free workshops will be held to offer assistance in Virginia Beach and other cities throughout the U.S.

The first half of 2012 saw more than 385,000 permanent loan modifications for struggling homeowners, HOPE NOW reported Tuesday. The voluntary, private sector alliance of mortgage professionals and non-profit counselors released its June 2012 data, showing that 385,468 homeowners received permanent loan modifications for the first half of the year.

An increase in loan modifications led to fewer delinquencies for commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) in July, according to Fitch Ratings. The decrease in CMBS delinquencies is the second consecutive month of declines as CMBS delinquencies fell to 8.48 percent in July, a drop of 14 basis points (bps) from June's 8.62 percent. According to the ratings agency, two large loan mods helped bring down the past due rate - the $305 million Schron Industrial Portfolio and the $210 million Savoy Park.

HARP-assisted refinances drove record refinance activity in the month of June, FHFA revealed Tuesday. The agency released its Refinance Report for June 2012, showing that refinance volume remained strong in June as mortgage rates fell to all-time lows. An estimated 33 percent of refinance volume was done through HARP, the highest percentage since HARP's inception. The report revealed that at the end of June, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae had refinanced 422,969 loans through HARP in 2012, more than the estimated total of 400,000 for all of 2011. This brings the total number of HARP refinances by the GSEs to 1.4 million.