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California rank: 30 90+ Day 3.18% 4.42% -28.1% 90+ Day 3.70% year ago 4.58% percent point change -19.4% -5.8% Top Core-Based Statistical Area Foreclosure RIVERSIDE-SAN BERNARDINO-ONTARIO, CA 90+ Day Delinquency Rate august 2012 4.41% year ago 6.23% percent point change -29.2% -14.1% note: The 90+ Day delinquecy rate is the percentage of outstanding mortgage loans that are 90- plus days delinquent. The foreclosure rate is the percentage of outstanding mortgage loans currently in foreclosure. State rank is based on the August 2012 foreclosure rate. All figures are rounded to the nearest decimal. The unemployment rate reflects preliminary August 2012 figures released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. All other data courtesy of Lender Processing Services. 4.22% 3.62% Rate 4.64% Delinquency Rate Foreclosure Rate august 2012 2.55% year ago 3.05% percent point change -16.3% Top County LAKE COUNTY Delinquency Rate august 2012 4.37% Foreclosure Rate Unemployment Rate 10.6% 11.9% -10.9% epicenter of the foreclosure and mortgage crisis. The Homeowner Bill of Rights will provide basic fairness and transparency for homeowners and improve the mortgage process for everyone." It will also give the Office of the Attorney General the ability to use a statewide grand jury to investigate and indict the perpetra- tors of financial crimes involving victims in multiple counties as outlined in SB 1474. AB 1950 extends the statute of limitations on mortgage-related crimes to three years. According to AB 2610, purchasers of tracking complaints saw a sharp decline, a trend Porter sees as a sign of cooperation with the settlement's restrictions. While servicers did work with the monitor's office to ensure fair attention was given to loan modifications since the settlement, that provided little to no comfort to homeowners who faced dual track- ing while waiting out the deadline, Porter said. "While some changes, such as implemen- As the October deadline approached, dual foreclosed homes must give tenants at least 90 days before starting eviction proceedings. If the tenant has a fixed-term lease, the new owner must honor the lease unless the owner can demonstrate certain exceptions. Gov. Brown had previously signed into law three other components of the Home- owner Bill of Rights that provide protections for struggling homeowners and offer tools to local governments and receivers to prevent neighborhood blight caused by vacancies. California Monitor Examines Servicers for Dual-Tracking Reform California Nordine Realtors Since 1990 Leo Nordine www.nordine.com - nordine@nordine.com over 3300 personal sales Katherine Porter's first evaluation examined the practice of dual tracking and described servicers' efforts to reform their practices before the October 2 deadline outlined in the national mortgage settlement. Dual tracking is a practice used by some mortgage companies that involves negotiating a loan modification for a distressed homeowner while initiating foreclosure sale proceedings at the same time. The national mortgage settlement California state settlement monitor IN THE NEWS Final California Homeowners' Rights Bills Signed into Law in late September the final components—SB 1474, AB 1950, and AB 2610—of the California Homeowner Bill of Rights, which will take effect in its entirety January 1, 2013. California Attorney General Kamala 76 California Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law restricted dual tracking, and the recently passed California Homeowner Bill of Rights provides protections for California mortgages serviced by the banks involved in the settle- ment. All five of the nation's biggest mort- gage lenders said they complied or worked with the Office of Settlement Management Oversight to conform to more than 300 new servicing standards. Porter, however, reports servicers took their Harris commented, "California has been the time on some issues. Porter confirmed that the companies in the settlement were given 180 days to reform their dual tracking procedures, a period during which consumer complaints about dual tracking actually increased, com- prising 25 percent of the total complaints heard by Porter's office at their height in August. tation of a single point of contact for borrower communication, occurred quickly, the banks have taken the full 180 days (six months) to stop dual tracking," Porter said. "This is per- missible under the settlement. But this waiting has been painful for homeowners, whose fate is uncertain under the dual track regime." Decline in REO Inventory Slows California Home Sales (C.A.R.) recently cited a lack of properties, mainly REOs, as the cause for a crimp in pending home sales in the Golden State. C.A.R. President LeFrancis Arnold said, The California Association of Realtors "While August's pending sales were higher than July, the pending sales decline from last year is not a surprise, as we started to see a gradual slowdown in the year-to-year change over the past five months, primarily due to a dearth of available homes." Although pending home sales rose in August from July, they were down from a year ago, putting a halt to a 15-month trend of yearly increases. C.A.R.'s pending home sales index, which is based on signed contracts, increased 2.7 percent between July and August but was 2 percent below where the index stood in August 2011. REOs were 14.4 percent of California's pending home sales in August, down from 17.4 percent in July and significantly lower than a year earlier when they made up 27.8 percent. The share of short sales increased though, inching up to 23 percent in August from 22.6 percent in July and 20.2 percent in August 2011. The combined share of all dis- tressed property sales shrunk to 37.8 percent in August, compared to 40.5 percent in July and 48.3 percent in August 2011. The available supply of REO inventory was down, with C.A.R.'s unsold inventory index showing the supply at 1.6 months. For short sales, the supply of available inventory is slightly better, coming in at 3.7 months, and for non-distressed sales it's 3.3 months. C.A.R. reported, with distressed sales