Report: Maryland Distressed Home Loans Decline

BALTIMORE (AP) -- A new report says fewer Marylanders are facing foreclosure or are behind on mortgage payments.

The report released Thursday by the Mortgage Bankers Association said the number of distressed loans in the fourth quarter was lowest since mid-2009.

The number of Marylanders who were behind on payments in the last three months of last year or in foreclosure fell 10 percent from the fourth quarter of 2009 to 140,000. That accounts for 13.5 percent of the more than one million loans in the state, according to the MBA's quarterly National Delinquency Survey.

Last year was the first time since 2005 that the percentage of delinquent borrowers fell at year's end compared to the same period a year earlier.

(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)