How much more talking is necessary to mandate action???

I know once the meltdown occured and it became apparant that the government would be required to jump in and provide a solution, the new frustration is waiting around for all of these hearings.....although needed to take place and finally mandate the lenders/servicers simply overhaul all of the mortgages which are deemed "problem loans." In the meantime, we are running out of time watching homeowner, after homeowner, family after family, community after community destroyed as the current environment is simply to go through the foreclosure problem, as if they didn't know a huge problem exist.

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In an effort to stem the rising foreclosure rate plaguing the economy, a House committee met Tuesday to learn more about the steps mortgage servicers are taking to assist homeowners.

"I am concerned there isn’t doing enough being done to modify loads and preventing foreclosures," said Rep Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity Hearing said in her opening statement.

More than 2.3 million homeowners faced foreclosure proceedings last year, an 81% spike from 2007, according to data from RealtyTrac released last week.

And the outlook isn’t good. According to Moody’s Economy.com, of the 52 million citizens with a home mortgages, close to 27% owe more on their mortgage than their house is now worth.

The chairwoman also expressed concern over the re-default rates. “When modifying loans servicers most ensure it is more affordable than before the modify, it makes little sense to modify a loan and still have it out of the reach of the bar.” she said.

“There are millions of families out there who are struggling and have tried to contact some of the people we have here testifying today,” she said.

Nine witnesses were at the hearing, testify in two panels. The first panel included Vance Morris, director for single family asset management at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development; Grovetta Gardineer, managing director of corporate and international activities at the Office of Thrift Supervision; Joseph H. Evers, deputy comptroller for large bank supervision at Office of the Comptroller of the Currency; and Patrick J. Lawler, chief economist of the Federal Housing Finance Agency.

The second panel included William C. Erbey, CEO of Owen Financial Corporation, Mary Coffin, executive vice president of Wells Fargo Home Mortgage Servicing, Michael Gross, managing director for loss mitigation at Bank of America, Molly Sheehan, senior vice president, of chase home lending at JP Morgan Chase and Steve Hemperly, executive vice president of mortgage default servicing at Citigroup (C: 1.453, 0.043, 3.05%).

"We have made much progress in the last year to develop and refine our data collection, validation, and reporting efforts, and our work in this area continues to evolve in response to supervisory needs and changing market trends,” said Evers in a prepared statement.

“We currently are working to provide additional data at a more granular level on the affordability of loan modifications as well as the types of loan modifications being implemented by the largest mortgage servicers. We continue to improve these efforts and to enhance the information we obtain, and we look forward to making the additional information available in future issues of our Report.”

The OCC and the Office of Thrift Supervision regulate some of the largest mortgage servicers in the nation.

Last week President Obama revealed an ambitious mortgage rescue plan to help up to nine million homeowners avoid foreclosure.

The plan includes $75 billion to help at-risk homeowners make payments and $200 billion from the Treasury Department to purchase preferred stock in Fannie Mae (FNM: 0.4006, -0.0294, -6.84%) and Freddie Mac (FRE: 0.401, -0.039, -8.86%).

The plan also allows four million to five million ineligible homeowners with mortgages through the two mortgage giants to refinance their home loans at lower rates.

"Our report will show that distressed borrowers serviced by Citi, who received modifications, reinstatements or repayment plans outnumbered those who were foreclosed by more than six to one in the fourth quarter of 2008, “ said Hemperly, in prepared remarks. “The number of borrowers serviced by Citi who received long term solutions, in the form of loan modifications, in the fourth quarter of 2008 increased by approximately 51% compared with the third quarter of 2008."

Citi holds about 7% of the loans in the nation and initiated a foreclosure moratorium on all Citi-owned first mortgage loans.

On Thursday the House of Representatives is expected to vote on a bill that would extend help to struggling home owners. The bill, HR 200, would allow bankruptcy judges to rewrite home loans and shield mortgage providers from bondholder lawsuits.