Industry Needs to "Double" Loan Mod Efforts

The mortgage industry is helping 250,000 struggling borrowers a month to stay in the homes, but that is "woefully inadequate," according to an association executive who represents some of the mortgage lenders and servicers. Financial Services Roundtable president and chief executive Steve Bartlett told a House panel that the industry is doing everything it can to double that number to 500,000 a month. "It has to be done for the economy to recover," Mr. Bartlett testified. The Hope Now alliance recently reported that servicers modified 101,000 mortgages in May and completed 148,000 repayment plans. These workouts totaled 249,000, down slightly from 260,500 in April. Separately, the GSE regulator reported the loan modifications completed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac fell by 12% from March to April. The Federal Housing Finance Agency noted that the government sponsored enterprises ended their streamlined modification program and began implementing the Obama administration's new Home Affordable Modification program in April. The government sponsored enterprises completed nearly 13,800 loan modifications in April, down from 15,700 in March.