US mortgage delinquencies reach a record high

[picasso moon]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/20/business/20mortgage.html
US Mortgage Delinquencies Reach a Record High, David Streitfeld, 11/20/09 (early edition)
Nearly one in 10 homeowners with mortgages were at least one payment behind in the third quarter, the Mortgage Bankers Association said Thursday.
That is the highest figure since the association began keeping records in 1972. It is up from about one in 14 mortgage holders in the third quarter of 2008...
The association’s delinquency numbers do not include those who are actually in foreclosure, a figure that also rose sharply, to 4.47 percent of all loans. A year ago, it was 2.97 percent.
The combined percentage of those in foreclosure as well as delinquent is 14.41 percent, or about one in seven mortgage holders. About 52 million homeowners have mortgages....
The data indicate that borrowers in trouble are no longer just those who took out subprime loans. High-quality prime fixed-rate mortgages now represent the largest share of new foreclosures.

[Shamaness]

Hey pm, just wanted to thank you for including a snip of the articles you post links to.  Very helpful.   

[picasso moon]

And thank you, shamaness. I figure it's good to know a little bit of what you're getting into before you jump on the surfboard.