Hope Now servicers completed 1.24 million proprietary loan modifications in 2010 — just about flat compared to the year before — but there was a significant decline in restructurings during the fourth quarter, according to a new report released by the group.
The yearend report shows residential servicers completed 258,600 proprietary modifications in 4Q, down 25% from 3Q.
These servicers completed another 83,742 mods in the fourth quarter that meet the requirements of the government's Home Affordable Modification Program, a 15% increase from the third quarter.
Servicers faced severe criticism in 2010 for putting struggling homeowners through a lot of stress even in cases where modifications were approved.
Republicans are calling HAMP a failure and recently introduced a bill to kill the program. Hope Now servicers completed 512,700 HAMP modifications last year.
"2010 was a very challenging year for the housing market, but Hope Now's data continue to support the fact that significant strides have been made to avail homeowners of all options before going to foreclosure," said Faith Schwartz, executive director of the group.
The Hope Now report also shows that foreclosure sales dropped sharply after September when the robo-signing revelations prompted state Attorneys General to require servicers to review their foreclosure processing procedures.
Foreclosure sales hit 117,500 in September and quickly dropped to 69,200 in October. In December, foreclosure sales totaled 56,450, up slightly from 55,150 in November. For the year, the Hope Now servicers completed 1.07 million foreclosure sales, compared to 947,000 in 2009.
The effect on foreclosure starts was not as dramatic. Foreclosure starts dropped from 245,200 in September to 205,100 in October and then rose to 232,200 by the end of December.
Meanwhile, the number of delinquent single-family loans fell by 30% during the year.
