The serious delinquency rate for Federal Housing Administration mortgages reached 9.6% in December, the highest level in more than two years, the Department of Housing and Urban Development said.

More than 711,000 FHA-insured loans were seriously delinquent, up 18.9% from one year earlier, according to the HUD report. It’s also a 3.2% increase from the month before. The delinquency rate has been steadily increasing since passing 8.2% last summer.

Meanwhile, originations are down. In December, the FHA insured 93,700 mortgages, a nearly 30% decline from the 133,000 insured in December 2010.

In its fiscal year 2011, the FHA Mutual Mortgage Insurance Fund  slipped to a 0.24% capital ratio from 0.5% the year prior. By law, the fund must remain above 2%.

FHA officials attempted to temper fears that the fund would need a bailout. An independent study done showed home prices would have to deteriorate significantly before an injection of tax dollars would be needed.

“It would take very significant declines in home prices in 2012 to create a situation where FHA would need additional support,” said FHA Acting Commissioner Carole Galante when the projections came out.

American Enterprise Institute Fellow Edward Pinto isn’t convinced. His study  claimed that FHA is actually undercapitalized by as much as $53 billion using more traditional accounting rules.

The FHA put new guidelines  in place this week that would tighten restrictions on lenders seeking approval to write FHA mortgages. Also, the changes would force more firms to buyback defaulted home loans and reduce seller concessions, which Pinto said would have the most impact, according to Pinto.

“We need to get back to where the mortgages themselves stand on their own regardless of what happens with house price inflation or deflation,” Pinto said.

FHA serious delinquency rate inches up while originations decline is a post from: Real Estate Short Sale REO Bank Owned Foreclosed Homes Investing private money lending expert

Court records indicate that O. J. Simpson is facing foreclosure on his Miami home while he is in prison in Nevada.

JPMorgan Chase filed for foreclosure on the four-bedroom, four-bath house in Kendall in September, the Associated Press reports. Simpson’s attorneys have since filed a motion to dismiss the case.

Simpson bought the house in 2000 for $575,000. It is currently assessed at $478,000, the AP says, citing Miami-Dade Circuit Court records.

Simpson, 64, is serving a prison sentence of nine to 33 years on a conviction of kidnapping and armed robbery in connection with an armed confrontation in Las Vegas with a sports memorabilia dealer.

The former football player and actor was acquitted in 1995 in Los Angeles of killing his ex-wife, Nicole Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman.

O.J. Simpson faces foreclosure on Miami house is a post from: Real Estate Short Sale REO Bank Owned Foreclosed Homes Investing private money lending expert

A recent study from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that non-seasonal vacant properties across the United States rose 51 percent over the span of a decade, from nearly 7 million in 2000 to 10 million in April 2010.

Ten states saw vacancies go up by 70 percent or more as a result of high foreclosure rates. Those with the largest increases over the last decade were Nevada (126 percent), Minnesota (100 percent), New Hampshire (99 percent), Arizona (92 percent), and Florida (90 percent). Georgia, Michigan, Colorado, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts also experienced increases above 70 percent.

The elevated number of vacant homes carries with it a hefty price tag for lenders that must resume ownership after foreclosure. GAO found that in 2010, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac reimbursed servicers and vendors over $953 million for property maintenance costs.

However, it’s local governments, many of which are already dealing with depleted funds, that are feeling “significant” pressures from the rise in home vacancies, according to GAO.

Vacant Foreclosures Saddle Local Communities With High Costs is a post from: Real Estate Short Sale REO Bank Owned Foreclosed Homes Investing private money lending expert

Wells Fargo , the largest mortgage lender in the U.S., reported record income of $4.1 billion, or 73 cents a share, for the fourth quarter, up 20% from one year ago.

For the full year, Wells earned $15.9 billion, up 28% from 2010.

Revenue at the San Francisco-based bank dipped to $20.6 billion in the fourth quarter from $21.5 billion last year. For all of 2011, revenue dropped to $80.9 billion, down 5% from the prior year

Wells Fargo earns record $4.1 billion in 4Q is a post from: Real Estate Short Sale REO Bank Owned Foreclosed Homes Investing private money lending expert

Freddie Mac announced it is giving mortgage servicers expanded authority to provide six months of forbearance to unemployed borrowers without Freddie Mac’s prior approval and up to an additional six months with prior approval.   This means unemployed borrowers may be eligible for up to 12 months of forbearance.  Freddie Mac’s forbearance options are being expanded at the direction of the Federal Housing Finance Agency and will take effect on February 1, 2012.

• Mortgage servicers can now approve unemployed borrowers with Freddie Mac owned- or guaranteed-loans for six months of forbearance without prior approval from Freddie Mac.
• Servicers can extend the forbearance period up to an additional six months with prior Freddie Mac approval, giving eligible unemployed borrowers with Freddie Mac owned- or guaranteed-mortgages up to one year of forbearance.
• The expanded forbearance options will take effect on February 1, 2012.
• Delinquent borrowers in an existing short term forbearance plan can be evaluated for an extended forbearance under the new policy.
• Previously Freddie Mac allowed servicers to grant up to three months of forbearance with no payment and without prior approval, or six months at a reduced payment with prior approval.  Longer forbearance required prior approval and was generally restricted to events such as natural disasters, permanent disability or long-term medical emergencies.
• According to the latest statistics, nearly 10 percent of delinquencies on Freddie Mac mortgages were tied to unemployment.

Freddie Mac extends forbearance to unemployed borrowers is a post from: Real Estate Short Sale REO Bank Owned Foreclosed Homes Investing private money lending expert

LPS index shows home value declines slowing down

Home value declines slowing down is a post from: Real Estate Short Sale REO Bank Owned Foreclosed Homes Investing private money lending expert

The number of seriously delinquent mortgages in the nation’s largest metropolitan areas slowed this year, according to a new study from the Urban Institute. But foreclosures remain a burden on the housing market, prompting the policy research group to call for a resolution to the housing crisis to ensure the foreclosure backlog is cleared out in a reasonable time period.

The institute said the serious delinquency rate in the 100 largest metro areas slowed to 9.3% in June from 10.4% in December 2009, according to data from Foreclosure-Response.org. The Urban Institute said the serious delinquency rate is classified as the share of loans in foreclosure, plus all of those that are more than 90 days in arrears.

“The foreclosure inventory that is building up is going to take an incredibly long time for lenders to clear,” said Leah Hendey, research associate at the Washington firm. “At the current pace of foreclosure sales, we are looking at a process that could take decades to complete. It is critical that the status of these properties be resolved quickly if we want to stabilize communities and housing markets.”

This decline was driven by a drop in delinquent loans, which fell to 3.7% in June from 5.5% in December 2009.

In hard-hit areas like Riverside and Stockton, Calif., the foreclosure rate declined significantly, dropping 1.9 percentage points and 1.7 percentage points from the peak two years ago.

Florida, New York and Illinois experienced a different shift in the market with foreclosure rates climbing in cities throughout those states.

In Tampa, the foreclosure rate jumped 2.8 percentage points, and in Chicago, it grew 2.3 percentage points. Those three states are judicial foreclosure states, which force a court to make a final decision before a property can leave the process. This leads to a growing backlog, the Urban Institute said.

Urban Institute: Foreclosure backlog to ‘take decades to complete’ is a post from: Real Estate Short Sale REO Bank Owned Foreclosed Homes Investing private money lending expert

Default servicing technology company Equator says nearly 1.2 million short sales were initiated through its module over the past two years.

The company tracks this data through its default servicing platform, which helps mortgage industry clients deal with loan modifications, short sales, deeds-in-lieu, foreclosure processing and REOs.

Los Angeles-based Equator said Wednesday that more than $150 billion in assets have been sold using its technology platform over the past eight years. Analyzing trends from the recent fourth quarter, Equator said servicers heading into 2012 are focused on compliance issues.

As the firm transitions into 2012, it’s launch of the REvolution software program, which will provide real estate professionals with a system to track both distressed and traditional properties.

The company said the software gives agents enough flexibility to automate their daily work-flow cycles from a single portal, removing the need for agents to employ more than one software system to handle various asset types and sales functions.

Equator saw 1.17 million short sales initiated is a post from: Real Estate Short Sale REO Bank Owned Foreclosed Homes Investing private money lending expert

Foreigners looking to purchase homes in the U.S. are increasing their online search activity for bargains, as sliding home prices continue to attract investors from around the globe — especially Canada.

Florida properties remained the lead attraction for foreign investment in the third quarter, followed by Arizona, Nevada and California, according to traffic on the website for Point2, a Canadian-based real estate marketing company. Those housing markets have experienced the steepest declines in home prices from the sector’s peak in June 2006.

The trade group said for the 12-month period ending March 31, new immigrants and foreign homebuyers were  mostly attracted to Arizona, California, Florida and Texas. Over that time, 58% of all international sales occurred in those states. Sales initiated by international buyers rose to $82 billion for the period, up from $66 billion a year earlier.

NAR found the most important factor influencing home purchases by international buyers was a desirable location, followed by the expected investment profitability of the property.

Canadian traffic generated the highest number of visits to all top 10 states listed on Point2′s website, with a significant majority in six out of the 10 states. Potential buyers in the United Kingdom and Mexico followed in second and third place, similar to the NAR study.

Foreign homebuyers jumping on depressed US housing markets is a post from: Real Estate Short Sale REO Bank Owned Foreclosed Homes Investing private money lending expert

California ranks first in home loan fraud, with the state seeing as much as $204.2 million in losses on deceptive mortgage activity.

That’s according to a new report from MortgageDaily, which found that lenders victimized by fraud faced inflated appraisals and fraudulent documentation.

California was followed by New York, which experienced $199.6 million in losses from nefarious activities in mortgage finance.

New York was followed by Florida, South Carolina and Minnesota in terms of fraudulent activity.

The total loss value of all mortgage activity in the third quarter hit $1.3 billion.

In the third quarter, the Mortgage Fraud Index maintained by MortgageDaily noted that there were 1,173 mortgage fraud cases in the third quarter.

California ranks No. 1 for mortgage fraud is a post from: Real Estate Short Sale REO Bank Owned Foreclosed Homes Investing private money lending expert