Lately, there have been a lot of rumors floating around regarding eviction and foreclosure moratoriums. Since it can be hard to keep up with all of the bills and court rulings happening, we wanted to clear the air!

Evictions

The CDC recently issued a new order, indefinitely halting evictions in United States counties with elevated transmission rates. According to the CDC map, all but one county in Florida is in the “elevated” zone.

The United States Supreme Court, however, ruled the CDC’s new order as unlawful on August 26th, 2021. The Supreme Court obviously has the final say on the matter, so there is currently NO eviction moratorium in Florida or any other state.

An excerpt from the Supreme Court ruling is as follows: “The U. S. District Court for the District of Columbia granted the plaintiffs summary judgment, holding that the CDC lacked statutory authority to impose the moratorium. Alabama Assn. of Realtors v. Department of Health and Human Servs., 2021 WL 1779282, *10 (May 5, 2021)”

You can read the full United States Supreme Court ruling Here. 

Foreclosures

The Federal foreclosure moratorium, which has been in effect since early 2020, expired on July 31st. Banks are now able to begin with foreclosure proceedings for non-government backed loans.

For the 75% of U.S. mortgages that are government-backed, borrowers in need of assistance have until September 30th, 2021 to file for mortgage forbearance. The maximum forbearance allowed is 18 months, which can be used consecutively or in pieces as needed.

How many foreclosures are expected?

Currently, there are about 1.75 million mortgagees in the United States that are behind on their payments. Many of these loans are expected to be paid before entering foreclosure, or apply for forbearance. Taking this into account, it is forecasted that at least 1 million homes will go into foreclosure over the next year or so.

For comparison, about 8 million homes were foreclosed on as a result of the 2008 recession.