Mortgage delinquencies continued to improve in November

The delinquency landscape continues to improve on a monthly basis, with the total delinquency rate in the nation falling to 3.59% in November, according to Black Knight’s November mortgage monitor published this week.

In October, the analytics vendor clocked the national delinquency rate at 3.74%. The 15-basis point improvement continues to point to the effectiveness of initiatives taken by policy makers and industry participants over the pandemic period to help borrowers stay in their homes.

Serious delinquencies are also starting to clear, with Black Knight’s report noting that 90+ day delinquencies dropped by 80,000 in November. However, the company noted that despite the decline, over 1 million serious delinquencies remain, which is 2.5 times more than at the start of the pandemic.

On a state-by-state basis, Louisiana (4.17%), Mississippi (3.62%) and Oklahoma (2.77%) have the highest serious delinquency percentages as of November.

Black Knight’s report states that further improvements in the overall delinquency picture should be expected in the months to come as borrowers exiting forbearance plans continue to work through loss mitigation options with their lenders.

Concurrently, forbearance has tumbled, dropping below the 1 million mark last month, Black Knight found.

As of Nov. 30, only 994,000 mortgage holders remain in COVID-19 related forbearance plans, representing 1.9% of all active first lien mortgages, Black Knight said. Out of the mortgage holders in forbearance, 1.1% have a GSE loan, 2.9% have FHA/VA loans, and 2.5% are portfolio held and privately securitized loans.

Getting more granular, over the past 60 days, more than 800,000 forbearance exits have been recorded, with nearly 560,000 homeowners remaining in post-forbearance loss mitigation, Black Knight said.

Meanwhile, foreclosure starts (3,700) and active foreclosure inventory (132,000) hit new record lows last month.

But despite things going in a good direction, Black Knight added that “given the size of this population, both serious delinquency and foreclosure metrics demand close attention as we enter 2022.”