For the first time since the early days of the pandemic, the number of mortgages in active forbearance is under 900,000, following an 11% decline for the week ended Dec. 7, according to Black Knight.
This leaves 882,000 borrowers remaining in forbearance, an 112,000 decline from the prior week and a 177,000 drop compared with the previous month. The last time active forbearance plans were this low was at the
Private-label securitizations and portfolio mortgages recorded the largest reduction in active plans from the previous week, with a decline of 15% and 49,000 loans exiting. The government-guaranteed mortgage programs, Federal Housing Administration and Veterans Affairs, had a 42,000 unit decrease, or 12%, while loans held by the government-sponsored enterprises only had a 7% decline, or 21,000 mortgages exiting.
"There is a modest opportunity for additional improvement in coming weeks with 33,000 loans still listed with November reviews for extension/removal (roughly half of which are expected to be reaching their
It was during the week ended Nov. 30 that active pandemic-related forbearance plans first sunk below the 1 million level.
But not all of the forbearance news from this past week is good, Black Knight cautioned. Oer that period, there were 17,000 new plan starts — defined as borrowers who hadn't been in forbearance before that now are.
"Plan starts are up 24% over the past four weeks, driven by a more than 40% increase among FHA/VA loans (with GSEs seeing a 29% increase)," Walden said. "We have been watching this trend closely and will continue to report on it."
This week's activity follows approximately 8,000 new starts for the
