The number of loan modifications completed on home loans jumped to the highest level in five months. Although government-supported modifications increased from a year earlier, proprietary activity plummeted.
Modifications completed on residential loans during March came to 45,321. The total included proprietary activity and modifications completed through the Home Affordable Modification Program.
That was the most modifications completed since October 2013, when 49,990 were completed.
HOPE NOW released the statistics on Monday.
Servicers completed 42,685 modifications in February.
During the first three months of 2014, completed modifications amounted to 132,783.
Mortgage servicers have slowed modification activity significantly since March 2013, when volume totaled 88,435.
“Since 2007, the mortgage industry has completed 6.97 million total permanent loan modifications for homeowners,” the report said. “Of those loan modifications, more than 5.6 million were proprietary programs and 1,352,861 were completed under HAMP.”
Proprietary modifications inched up to 32,142 from 30,230 in February but plunged from 76,522 in the same month during 2013.
The March 2014 proprietary number included 18,000 transactions that reduced monthly principal and interest payments by more than 10 percent.
HAMP activity crept up to 13,179 in March from 12,455 a month earlier and 11,913 a year earlier.
