Yesterday, Dugan said that the "shift in emphasis by servicers to more sustainable, payment-reducing modifications is a positive step that should show significant benefits in coming months."
He said he believes the Obama administration's Making Home Affordable program, which seeks to modify or refinance 9 million mortgages, will help "offset the impact of this very difficult economic cycle."
Unlike Philadelphia's foreclosure-diversion program, which requires mandatory lender participation, Making Home Affordable is voluntary. (A state House bill that would have brought foreclosure diversion to all of Pennsylvania was withdrawn by its sponsor, Philadelphia Democrat Michael McGeehan, when lenders tried to make it voluntary.)
So far, 16 mortgage servicers, representing 80 percent of home loans nationally, have signed on to Making Home Affordable, according to Deputy Treasury Secretary Seth Wheeler.
That isn't enough for the community-action group ACORN, which sponsored protests yesterday in Philadelphia and 13 other cities against what it calls "the Homewrecker 4" -- Goldman Sachs' Litton subsidiary, Barclays' HomEq, American Home Mortgage, and OneWest.
The Philadelphia protest, at Goldman Sachs' Market Street office, was small compared to others, said ACORN's legislative director, Ian Phillips. Litton services a large number of mortgages in this region, he said.
Neither national statistics nor local protest affected the City Hall celebration, attended by some of the 250 lawyers who donate their time representing homeowners, as well as those who have been knocking on the doors of homeowners facing foreclosure to get them to participate in the diversion program.
"Even if you saved just one house," State Supreme Court Chief Justice Ronald Castille said, "that would have made this program a success."
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Contact real estate writer Alan J. Heavens at 215-854-2472 or aheavens@phillynews.com.
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