Housing Crisis, Foreclosure | featured news

The Obama administration's loan modification program is finally underway.

U.S. foreclosure activity leaped 46 percent in March from a year earlier, hitting a record high as programs stunting the torrid pace of failing mortgages expired, RealtyTrac reported on Thursday.

Addie Polk, who became the national face of the foreclosure crisis last fall when she shot herself during an eviction, was a quiet woman who never asked for help.

The House has passed legislation to give debt-strapped homeowners a chance to win lower mortgage payments through bankruptcy courts.

About one in every eight U.S. households, a record share, ended 2008 behind on their mortgage payments or in the foreclosure process as job losses intensified a housing crisis spawned by lax lending practices, the Mortgage Bankers Association said on Thursday

The Obama administration today released details of $75 billion home loan modification and refinancing programs. Borrowers can start contacting loan servicers.

One in five U.S. homeowners with mortgages owe more to their lenders than their homes are worth, and the rate will increase as housing prices drop in states that have so far avoided the worst of the crisis, a new study shows.

While some U.S. governors were embracing the housing plan President Barack Obama announced last week, as a way to bolster their own assistance efforts, others worried that the plan is unfair.

Some believe the $75-billion proposal could provide the help they need to stay in their homes. Others -- even though they 'feel for people who are having trouble' -- say it's a taxpayer-funded bailout.

As the Obama administration steps up efforts to help troubled homeowners modify their mortgages, it might consider the experiences of two South Floridians.