Paul Centopani

While the haggling tapered off slightly alongside the housing market’s seasonal slowdown, home sales remained five times more competitive than the year before, according to Redfin.

With coronavirus inoculations underway and government stimulus likely to come, the outlook for next year’s housing market and lending environment grew more optimistic in December.

The forbearance rate continued its improvement, but the surge of COVID-19 cases could lead to more borrowers needing mortgage relief, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.

The largest concerns are with pandemic risk and defaults, along with business resilience and adaptability, according to a Wolters Kluwer survey.

While 12,000 mortgages exited forbearance, the most borrowers entered forbearance protection in a week since early September, according to Black Knight.

The November foreclosure rate represented an 80% decline from the year before, according to Attom Data Solutions.

Borrowers who exit CARES Act-related forbearance in the spring and have stacks of other bills to attend to may be in search of liquidity via such products, the company predicts.

Clear HOI — an encrypted, cloud-based tool that automates homeowners insurance underwriting — is getting released to the broader market by Rocket Mortgage’s sister company Nexsys Technologies.

While distressed mortgage rates crept down overall, serious delinquencies still tripled year-ago rates in September, according to CoreLogic.

The surge of COVID-19 cases slowed economic recovery and hampered improvements in the forbearance rate, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.