According to the latest report from the Mortgage Bankers Association, a stunning 12 percent of homeowners with a mortgage are now at least one payment behind. Given the nationwide estimate that 25 percent of homeowners with a mortgage are now underwater, this really shouldn't come as a huge surprise - but it is a stunning number in historical terms in any case.
What is actually MOST surprising to me is that anyone still thinks we have a "foreclosure problem" at all. Or that lenders are "aggressively foreclosing". Shoot, let's be realistic, we have almost no foreclosures in comparison to the number of folks that are not making their payment, and even fewer in comparison to the number of folks that are now seriously upside down in their home and essentially stuck in a prison of debt.
So the next time you see a reporter talking about the "foreclosure problem", or are at the other end of an ACORN bullhorn, let them know that we actually have an unbelievably low number of foreclosures given how many homeowners are upside down and not making their payments. And then politely suggest they are focused on the wrong problem and have completely missed the bigger picture - $4 Trillion in excess mortgage debt.