The monthly growth of government loan modifications tumbled and has slowed by more than two thirds over the past year. Hurting the latest month was JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. Proprietary activity was also on the decline.
As of April 30, mortgage servicers have completed 801,538 loan modifications under the Home Affordable Modification Program, according to monthly housing data provided by the Obama administration.
That was only 6,790 more modifications than had been completed as of March 31.
In March, completed HAMPs had risen by 12,139, while the increase was 21,699 in April 2011.
The dismal performance during the most-recent month was driven by Chase, where the number of completed modifications declined to 129,760 from 133,885 as of the end of March.
At the other end of the spectrum was Ocwen Loan Servicing LLC, where completed HAMPs increased to 46,156 from March’s 39,466. HAMPÂ activity for Litton Loan Servicing LP was recently added to Ocwen’s total. The 6,690 increase at Ocwen was the biggest gain of any servicer during April.
A distant second was Wells Fargo Bank, N.A., which saw an increase of 1,115.
After that was a gain of 417 at OneWest Bank, a 308 increase at GMAC Mortgage LLC and a rise of 201 at CitiMortgage Inc.
In addition to HAMPÂ modifications, servicers completed 42,962 proprietary loan modifications in April, according to HOPEÂ NOW.
Proprietary activity slipped from 46,852 modifications completed in March. Volume was also down from the same month in 2011, when 57,034 proprietary modifications were completed.
“We are particularly encouraged by stable trends in recidivism, or re-defaults, on loan modifications,” HOPE NOW Executive Director Faith Schwartz said in the report. “Our data shows that permanent proprietary loan modifications remained less than 90 days past due for 80 percent of the modifications, based on data reported from May 2010 to April 2011.
“This is very significant since it illustrates that servicers have used more tools at their disposal than ever before — lower rate, extended terms and principal forbearance or write down — to create sustainable modifications for homeowners at risk.”
Since second half of 2007, there have been 4,470,169 proprietary modifications completed.
