The executive director of the Louisiana Mortgage Bankers Association says he expects the number of foreclosures around the state to rise in 2009. Roderick Russell, who serves as a mortgage loan originator with Omni Bank in Mandeville, says the same dynamics that are at play with the spread of fashion trends are at work. “It’s kind of like you get a new piece of clothing out of Paris or Milan, it hits New York, Los Angeles and Miami first. Then it hits the South nine months to a year later,” he says.
According to figures that came out earlier this month from the Mortgage Bankers Association, Louisiana ranked seventh for mortgage delinquencies in the fourth quarter. During the last three months of 2008, 10.13% of all mortgages were past due. That’s a sign that the recession is hitting the state, Russell says. He notes that some of the offshore employers in Lafayette, Houma/Thibodaux and Morgan City are beginning to cut back on hours. “Those people make the bulk of their money from overtime, they can’t live on regular hours,” he says. Louisiana has been largely cushioned from the wave of foreclosures because of the oil-based economy and the fact that many servicers are still waiting on Road Home funds, Russell says. “Delinquencies are going to increase,” he says. Baton Rouge should be removed from some of the problems because the economic base is still fairly strong, he says.—Timothy Boone
