by Calculated Risk on 5/21/2012 04:45:00 PM

LPS released their First Look report for April today. LPS reported that the percent of loans delinquent increased slightly in April from March, and declined year-over-year. The percent of loans in the foreclosure process was unchanged and remained at a very high level.

LPS reported the U.S. mortgage delinquency rate (loans 30 or more days past due, but not in foreclosure) increased to 7.12% from 7.09% in March. The percent of delinquent loans is still significantly above the normal rate of around 4.5% to 5%. The percent of delinquent loans peaked at 10.97%, so delinquencies have fallen over half way back to normal. Note: There is a seasonal pattern for delinquencies, and it is not unusual to see an increase in April after a sharp decline in March.

The following table shows the LPS numbers for April 2012, and also for last month (March 2012) and one year ago (April 2011).

LPS: Percent Loans Delinquent and in Foreclosure Process
	Apr-12	Mar-12	Apr-11
Delinquent	7.12%	7.09%	7.97%
In Foreclosure	4.14%	4.14%	4.14%
Number of loans:
Loans Less than 90 days	1,927,000	1,888,000	2,243,000
Loans More than 90 days	1,595,000	1,643,000	1,961,000
Loans In foreclosure	2,048,000	2,060,000	2,184,000
Total	5,570,000	5,591,000	6,388,000

The number of delinquent loans is down about 16% year-over-year (682,000 fewer mortgages delinquent), and the number of loans in the foreclosure process is down 136,000 year-over-year (the percent in foreclosure is unchanged, but the number of total loans has declined).

The percent of loans less than 90 days delinquent is about normal, but the percent (and number) of loans 90+ days delinquent and in the foreclosure process are still very high.