More than two hundred counselors from organizations around the country registered for up to five days of foreclosure intervention counseling training delivered by NeighborWorks America through its Center for Homeownership Education and Counseling, the nonprofit said Monday. The effort underscores the need that even community assistance groups have to ramp up staff to address a burgeoning number of troubled homeowners nationwide. It also shows that servicing operations aren’t the only outfits facing the challenge of bringing new staff on board to handle key borrower contact and loss mitigation activities. Many community leaders have argued in places like Philadelphia that credit counselors — and not loss mitigators — should have responsibility for defining loan workout terms for troubled borrowers, reasoning that internal servicing departments lack the needed staffing. “It’s vitally important that we strengthen and expand the capacity of the non-profit community to deal with the growing foreclosure crisis,” said Timothy Adams, Mid-Atlantic district director for NeighborWorks America. “With more than eight million families living in homes worth less than their mortgages and one out of four subprime mortgages already in delinquency, the housing counseling community is needed more than ever to help slow the rise in foreclosure.” NeighborWorks America estimates that more than three thousand training certificates in homeownership, foreclosure intervention and default counseling will be earned at the upcoming and other training classes scheduled around the country in 2008. For more information, visit http://www.nw.org.

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