Foreclosure Filings See Record Jump

March mortgage workout results announced recently by Hope Now - a coalition of mortgage lenders, servicers, investors and community groups put together to fight the foreclosure plague - were a decidedly mixed bag for the month.

Lenders continued to rewrite troubled mortgages at a fast clip during March, but the weakening economy still sent foreclosure starts soaring to a record high, where approximately 134,000 mortgages were rewritten by Hope Now memebers, which is nearly 20,000 more than the average since last September.

More homeowners fell into default in March. Servicers initiated foreclosure proceedings against 290,000 mortgage borrowers, a jump of nearly 20% from February's 243,000, and the highest monthly total since the coalition began tracking data in mid-2007, the time when the mortgage meltdown hit. Since that time, 1,447,866 homes have been lost to foreclosure. Starts have risen by more than a third since January.

It is hoped that the impact of the Homeowner Affordability and Stability Plan should begin to be felt soon. Eleven major servicers have formally signed on, and analysts are predicting an improvement in the mortgage landscape.