Shares of Mortgages in Forbearance Decline for 17th Week in a Row in Week Ending June 20th, 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 3.93% of servicers’ portfolio volume in the prior week to 3.91% as of June 20, 2021. According to MBA’s estimate, 2 million homeowners are in forbearance plans. The share of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans in forbearance decreased 3 basis points to 2.02%. Ginnie Mae loans in forbearance decreased 2 basis points to 5.13%, while the forbearance shares for portfolio loans and private-label securities (PLS) decreased 1 basis point to 7.97%. The percentage of loans in forbearance for independent mortgage bank (IMB) servicers decreased 2 basis points to 4.03%, and the percentage of loans in forbearance for depository servicers declined 2 basis points to 4.14%. In remarks prepared for the release of this week’s survey Mike Fratantoni, MBA’s Senior Vice President and Chief Economist said, “The share of loans in forbearance declined for the 17th straight week, with small declines across almost every loan category. The rate of forbearance exits slowed – as has been typical in mid-month reports – but the pace of new forbearance requests remained at a very low level of 4 basis points.” Fratantoni went onto say, “The steady improvement in the aggregate forbearance numbers is heartening, as it is evidence that improving economic conditions are allowing more homeowners to get back on their feet. However, we continue to closely monitor the number of forbearance re-entries, reflecting borrowers who exited forbearance but had to re-enter due to hardships. These re-entries accounted for 6.2 percent of loans in forbearance this week.”