Almost 503,000 homeowners were able to stay in their homes during the first quarter of 2008 because of loan workouts provided by mortgage servicers, according to a new report issued by HOPE NOW.
Specifically, the alliance found the following: On an industry-wide basis, servicers provided loan workouts for about 1,376,000 homeowners since July 2007; of the 502,500 prime and subprime loan workouts that servicers provided to homeowners during the first quarter of 2008, approximately 323,000 were repayment plans and 179,500 were loan modifications; during the first quarter of 2008, loan modifications represented 44% of all subprime loan workouts, which is double the 2007 rate; and in March, loan modifications were 49% of all subprime workouts.
In addition, says HOPE NOW, there were 431,171 subprime 2/28 and 3/27 loans that were scheduled to reset during the first quarter of 2008. A total of 14,418 of these loans have been modified, and nearly 64% were modified for five years or more, while 203,000 of these loans (47%) were paid in full through refinancing or sale.
