Julie Haviv
The percentage of current and performing mortgages fell to 86.4 percent at the end of the fourth quarter of 2009, down 0.9 percent from the previous three months, marking a decline for the seventh consecutive quarter, the report by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Office of Thrift Supervision said.
It was also down 3.9 percent from a year earlier.
The decline was attributable to a 21.1 percent jump in mortgages 90 or more days past due, to 4.7 percent of all mortgages in the portfolio at the end of 2009.
The increase in seriously delinquent mortgages was most pronounced among prime borrowers, with an increase of 16.5 percent in seriously delinquent mortgages during the fourth quarter.
The jump in seriously delinquent mortgages is likely to lead to a rise in foreclosure actions, the report said.
So-called prime mortgages are granted to the most credit-worthy borrowers, a sector that initially raised few worries when the housing bubble burst.
The continued decline in performance of prime mortgages is a significant trend, given those mortgages accounted for 68 percent of all home loans within the portfolio.
The report by the U.S. Treasury Department units covers nearly 34 million loans totaling almost $6 trillion in principal balances and provides information on their performance through the end of the fourth quarter of 2009.
The report defines "serious delinquencies" as those loans 60 days or more past due and loans delinquent to bankrupt borrowers.
Mortgage delinquencies rise to nearly 14 percent
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