Mortgages in Forbearance Decline for 27th Consecutive Week in the Week Ending August 29, 2021

The latest Mortgage Banker Association’s (MBA) Forbearance and Call Survey reports that the total number of loans now in forbearance decreased by 2 basis points from 3.25% of servicers’ portfolio volume in the prior week, to 3.23% as of August 29, 2021. According to MBA’s estimate, 1.6 million homeowners are in forbearance plans. The share of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans in forbearance decreased 3 basis points to 1.63%. Ginnie Mae loans in forbearance decreased 29 basis points to 3.63%, while the forbearance shares for portfolio loans and private-label securities (PLS) increased 34 basis points to 7.52%. The percentage of loans in forbearance for independent mortgage bank (IMB) servicers decreased 1 basis point to 3.49%, and the percentage of loans in forbearance for depository servicers decreased 2 basis points to 3.33%.

In a statement 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 decreased by two basis points last week, with both new requests and exits remaining at a slow pace as we reached the end of August.”

“There was another large shift in the location of many FHA and VA loans, which have been bought out of Ginnie Mae pools and moved onto servicer balance sheets. As a result, there was a sharp drop in the share of Ginnie Mae loans in forbearance, and an offsetting increase in the share of portfolio loans in forbearance. These buyouts enable servicers to stop advancing principal and interest payments, and work with borrowers to begin paying again before they are re-securitized into Ginnie Mae pools,” Fratantoni added.