- The decline in the number of mortgages in active forbearance plans continues for the sixth straight week and represents the largest drop in six months, according to Black Knight's McDash Flash Forbearance Tracker.
- The number of active plans fell by 228K in the week ended April 6, falling 9% in one week.
Source: Black Knight
- The decline is largely driven by early forbearance entrants exiting their plans at the 12-month mark, Black Knight said.
- As of April 6, 2.3M homeowners remain in forbearance, representing 4.4% of all homeowners with mortgages. And the potential for further improvement remains though April into May as 500K more plans have April month-end expirations.
- An estimated 280K homeowners exited forbearance in the past week, representing more than half of all loans being reviewed for extension and removal. By contrast, about 8 out 10 plans reviewed resulted in forbearance extension in the prior week.
- Fewer mortgages were also entering forbearance with an estimated 158K starts in the past four weeks, down 18% from the previous four-week period.
- As the number of mortgages in forbearance falls, so does the estimated monthly advances for principal & interest (P&I) and tax & insurance (T&I).
- Estimated monthly P&I advances on active forbearance plans stands at $2.8B, down from $3.1B in the prior week.
- Estimated monthly T&I advances on active forbearance plans drops to $1.0B vs. $1.1B a week earlier.
- Major mortgage servicers include: New Residential (NYSE:NRZ), Mr. Cooper (NASDAQ:COOP), Ocwen Financial (NYSE:OCN), and PennyMac Financial Services (NYSE:PFSI).