California Mortgage Defaults Drop

LA JOLLA, Ca. (DQNews) -- The number of California homes entering the foreclosure process declined again during fourth quarter 2009 amid signs that the worst may be over in hard-hit entry-level markets, while slowly spreading to more expensive neighborhoods. There are mixed signals for 2010: It's unclear how much of the drop in mortgage defaults is due to shifting market conditions, and how much is the result of changing foreclosure policies among lenders and loan servicers, a real estate information service reported.

A total of 84,568 Notices of Default ("NODs") were recorded at county recorder offices during the October-to-December period. That was down 24.3% from 111,689 for the prior quarter, and up 12.4% from 75,230 in fourth-quarter 2008, according to MDA DataQuick. The San Diego firm tracks real estate trends nationally via public property records.

NODs reached an all-time high in first quarter 2009 of 135,431, a number that was inflated by activity put off from the prior four months. In the second quarter of last year, NODs totaled 124,562. The low of recent years was in the third quarter of 2004 at 12,417, when housing market annual appreciation rates were around 20%.

"Clearly, many lenders and servicers have concluded that the traditional foreclosure process isn't necessarily the best way to process market distress, and that losses may be mitigated with so-called short sales or when loan terms are renegotiated with homeowners," said John Walsh, DataQuick president.

While many of the loans that went into default during fourth quarter 2009 were originated in early 2007, the median origination month for last quarter's defaulted loans was July 2006, the same month as during the prior three quarters. The median origination month during the last quarter of 2008 was June 2006. This means the foreclosure process has moved forward through one month of bad loans during the past 12 months.