JPM: Mods to Lower Home Foreclosures

There will probably be 6.4 million additional home foreclosures between March of this year and mid-2011, or about 2.5 million less than there would be if mortgages were not being reworked to aid borrowers, according to a team of JPMorgan Chase & Co. analysts.

The modification-adjusted number will lessen home price declines "only slightly," the mortgage bond analysts, led by John Sim in New York, wrote in a report published last week.

Instead of falling 41% from its peak, the average home price will probably drop 39%, the report said.

Lenders and regulators are stepping up efforts to get mortgage terms modified to stem foreclosures. The benefits to home prices will be mitigated by "the lagged effects of rising unemployment" and the "momentum" of declines, the JPMorgan Chase analysts wrote. "These two factors are weakening the impact of reduced foreclosures due to modifications."