Forbearance Rate Finally Dips to Pre-pandemic Levels in Week Ending September 19, 2021

The latest Mortgage Banker Association’s (MBA) Forbearance and Call Survey reports that the total number of loans now in forbearance decreased by 4 basis points from 3.00% of servicers’ portfolio volume in the prior week to 2.96% as of September 19, 2021. According to MBA’s estimate, 1.5 million homeowners are in forbearance plans. The share of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans in forbearance decreased 3 basis points to 1.44%. Ginnie Mae loans in forbearance increased 3 basis points to 3.42%, and the forbearance share for portfolio loans and private-label securities (PLS) decreased 4 basis points to 6.91%. The percentage of loans in forbearance for independent mortgage bank (IMB) servicers decreased 1 basis point relative to the prior week to 3.24%, and the percentage of loans in forbearance for depository servicers decreased 4 basis points to 3.06%.

In remarks prepared for the release of this week’s forbearance survey, Mike Fratantoni, MBA’s Senior Vice President and Chief Economist said, “The share of loans in forbearance continued to decrease last week, dropping below 3 percent for the first time since March 2020. However, there was a slight increase in the forbearance share for Ginnie Mae loans, and this increase was seen for both depository and IMB servicers. New forbearance requests and re-entries continue to run at a higher rate for Ginnie Mae loans as well as for portfolio and PLS loans, which include many delinquent FHA, VA, and USDA loans that have been bought out of Ginnie Mae pools.”