A recently released Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) report examining mortgage servicing amid the COVID-19 pandemic maintains
homeowners continually face risks and challenges affiliated with mortgage servicers.
“While many mortgage servicers are successfully assisting borrowers to avoid foreclosure, today’s report highlights that some servicers are lagging their peers and are less well-equipped to assist borrowers who have exited pandemic housing protections,” CFPB Director Rohit Chopra said. “We will be closely monitoring mortgage servicer performance to ensure that they are meeting their obligations under the law.”
The CFPB indicated the report findings stem from data collected across 16 large servicers from May through December 2021, pinpointing issues borrowers have encountered while struggling to make mortgage payments upon exiting COVID-19 hardship forbearances.
At the close of last year, 330,000 homeowners had delinquent loans. According to the CFPB, their loans were no longer in forbearance, and they had no loss mitigation solution. Additionally, consumers were challenged by an inability to reach or get a timely response from their mortgage servicer’s call center, the CFPB noted.
The CFPB determined key report findings included data on borrowers’ language preferences remained limited, some mortgage servicers relied on systems unable to provide information on key metrics, and borrowers’ language preferences concerning data remained limited.