Mortgage delinquencies fell 12% in August

Mortgage delinquencies fell almost 12% in August from a year earlier, according to data released Tuesday by Lender Processing Services Inc. That reading comes on the heels of news barely three weeks ago that the combined delinquency rate on mortgages held by major banks fell to 6.68% in the second quarter, the lowest level since the third quarter of 2009, according to Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. data. The total U.S. delinquency rate, indicating loans more than 30 days past due but not in foreclosure, dipped to 8.13% last month, according to the LPS data. That was a 2.5% decline from July, when the delinquency rate registered 8.34%, according to month-end mortgage performance statistics from LPS’s database of some 40 million mortgage loans. About 4.25 million properties were at least 30 days delinquent but not yet in foreclosure in August, with 1.9 million of those at least 90 days past due. Meanwhile, the foreclosure pre-sale inventory rate, which measures the number of properties that have entered the foreclosure process but not yet been sold, rose 8.2% from a year earlier, to 2.15 million properties. Florida, Mississippi, Nevada, New Jersey and Illinois had the highest percentage of loans in delinquency or foreclosure. The states with the lowest rates of non-current loans were Montana, Wyoming, Alaska, South Dakota and North Dakota. Write to Liz Enochs.