As the foreclosure race heats up lenders may become less stringent in their approach towards defaulting homeowners. In the current climate the housing bubble keeps stretching not bursting. The number of mortgage foreclosures increased nationwide in April up 62 percent from last year. According to April figures released by RealtyTrac, an online marketplace for foreclosure properties, 147,708 foreclosure filings, auction sale notices, default notices, and bank repossessions were reported. However, that is a marginal decrease of 1 percent from March 2007. These residual effects are mainly due to the volatile cocktail mixture of the preceding housing boom; risky lending practices, buyers/investors overextending their finances to chase far-fetched monetary wealth, housing developers’ inability to foresee the eventual cooling of the housing market thus, unable to arrest the frantic new supplies of houses for ever lessening demand.  

Herein, we are left with an overabundant supply chasing buyers who have been patiently waiting on the sidelines for bargains. While the buyers wait and wait and wait, the houses stay and stay on the market, leading to a vicious cycle in which the housing prices are depressed. Some will argue that the lowering of housing prices is not that great. The prices are still selling above realistic market values; unlike market values that increased as if on steroids during the boom years. But after the boom has gone bust, many mortgage lenders are now feeling the pain of the current situation which they were instrumental in creating.  The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) calls this blowback, meaning unforeseen and negative effects at home that result from clandestine operations abroad.   

The blowback for many lenders, especially subprime lenders has been boomtime facile lending practices of over-generosity to several borrowers coupled many times with instances of winking at their unpalatable credit histories. As a result, this has led to current unforeseen and negative consequences of homeowners’ incapacity to sustain mortgage payments, leading to numerous foreclosures. “The rise in foreclosure activity was quite dramatic and widespread in the first quarter, with 37 out of the 50 states reporting year-over-year increases,” said James J. Saccacio, chief executive officer of RealtyTrac. “Certainly the surge in subprime defaults has contributed to the overall rise in foreclosures; we estimate that more than 50 percent of the foreclosure activity we charted in the first quarter was from subprime loans. However, it’s not just low-end homes that are going into foreclosure; we’re seeing a rising percentage of foreclosures with an estimated market value of more than $750,000.” 

So what is a lender to do? Some lenders such as Citigroup and Bank of America have come up with rehabilitation strategies; both have committed $1 billon to Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America, a non-profit community advocacy group which aids in refinance of loans to certain in-peril borrowers. Some wide ranging plans of forbearance have been implemented, ranging from converting adjustable rate mortgages to fixed loans, suspending payments for a certain period (in some instances one to two years) until resumption of payment, and to the extent of even readjusting the loan note itself. 

However, one mustn’t be beguiled that lenders are doing this out of the goodness of their hearts; to them it is mere economics.  For it is, when a borrower defaults, it costs the lender out of pocket an average of $40,000 per home in associated costs. Lenders have awakened to the reality that they are economically healthier if they help borrowers’ with payment rehabilitation than foreclosure. The rehabilitation program has been successful in cities where implemented, such as Dallas, Texas. But only time will tell what the future holds for the housing arena.