For people with mortgage troubles, Department of Housing and Urban Development-supported housing counseling is often the last place they look to for help.
Most are likely to first go to friends and family, and then to their lender. Finally, they will seek housing counseling support, say recent results of a survey conducted by Money Management International.
One fourth of the 1,000 survey respondents said they either needed assistance or knew someone who needed assistance meeting their mortgage payments over the last four years. A surprising result, MMI notes, perhaps due to the widespread media coverage of the housing crisis.
For those who did need help meeting payments, 50% said they would first go to friends and family. Another 26% said they would first go to their lender, and finally just 13% said they’d first seek a credit counseling service.
The MMI survey also found people 55 and older were less likely to have problems meeting their mortgage payments, or to know someone who needed help. This could suggest that they are less likely to have a mortgage in general, MMI said, or that they are better money managers.
View the full survey results.
Written by Elizabeth Ecker
