A mortgage delinquency rate of 3.53 percent sounds like a warning, but ICE says the August reading is mostly the calendar working itself out. Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), which publishes a monthly First Look at mortgage performance, reported that the national rate rose 14 basis points in August after falling in July, and that adjusted for the calendar-driven July dip, the rate was roughly flat. The sturdier signal sits elsewhere in the same release: the rate at which mortgages are being paid off early fell to a 17-month low.
For anyone with a home loan, the 3.53 percent is a measure of how many other borrowers are behind, not a change to any single payment. About 3.5 of every 100 home loans were past due in August, and 1.04 percent of active loans were seriously delinquent. What does reach an owner’s own costs is the interest rate on a new or refinanced loan, which is where the prepayment figure comes in. A basis point, the unit ICE uses, is one-hundredth of a percentage point, so 14 basis points is 0.14.
ICE’s July report, published August 25, showed this same rate falling 16 basis points, so the monthly readings swing in both directions.
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A 14-basis-point rise that ICE calls roughly flat
The July First Look had the national delinquency rate falling 16 basis points, which put it 12 basis points above a year earlier and 46 below July 2019. ICE attributed that July decline to the calendar. August gave back 14 basis points of it, and in the company’s August release the 3.53 percent is 10 basis points above August 2025 and 35 below August 2019. It is also below every pre-pandemic August on record, a comparison that sets the current rate against the years before 2020 rather than the years of forbearance that followed.
Early-stage trouble is not the driver. Loans that are 30 and 60 days past due rose in August but number 21,000 fewer than a year earlier. A rate that is up 10 basis points on the year while the earliest missed payments are down points to the later stages of delinquency, which is where ICE’s other August figures sit. ICE’s own calendar adjustment removes most of the monthly move.
Seriously late loans end a five-month decline
Seriously delinquent loans rose by 11,000 in August to 574,000, which ended five straight months of declines and left the count 19 percent above a year earlier. As a share of active loans that is 1.04 percent, against an average of 1.03 percent for Augusts from 2017 through 2019. The count is up sharply on the year, but the rate has returned only to where it stood in the years before the pandemic, so the rise is a normalization more than a break from the past.
Bob Hart, President of Mortgage Technology at ICE, summed up the release this way: “While overall performance remains sound, the market isn’t moving uniformly.” A month earlier, Andy Walden, ICE’s Head of Mortgage and Housing Market Research, had said “mortgage performance may be finding firmer footing beneath the surface.” Both statements fit the August numbers. The headline rate is near its long-run range, and the seriously delinquent count is the piece that moved against the trend.
Prepayments fall to a 17-month low as rates climb
ICE’s single-month mortality rate, its measure of loans paid off early in a given month through a sale or a refinance, fell 11 basis points to 0.64 percent in August. It was the fifth straight monthly decline and the lowest reading in 17 months. The July figure had been 0.74 percent, the lowest since January. ICE cited higher mortgage rates as the driver, since an owner holding a cheaper older loan has little reason to sell or refinance into a more expensive one.
The rate backdrop supports that reading. Freddie Mac’s weekly survey put the average 30-year fixed mortgage rate at 7.28 percent on October 1, up from 7.03 percent the week before and from 6.34 percent a year earlier. ICE said loans originated from 2023 through 2025 led the drop in prepayments, and the monthly rate on those loans eased to 0.91 percent from a March peak of 2.32 percent. Fewer payoffs mean fewer homes changing hands, which keeps mortgages on the books longer.
When a mortgage payment is out of reach
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s guidance for borrowers who cannot pay a mortgage starts with a call to the servicer right away, using the number on the monthly statement. The bureau says to be ready to explain why the payment cannot be made, whether the problem is temporary or lasting, and what income, expenses and cash on hand look like. The servicer may then offer an assistance application and one of several options: refinancing, a loan modification, a repayment plan, forbearance, a short sale or a deed in lieu of foreclosure.
Free help is available from a HUD-approved housing counseling agency, and the bureau lists the HOPE Hotline at (888) 995-HOPE (4673), open around the clock. It warns that upfront fees, guaranteed results, requests to sign over a title and instructions to stop paying the mortgage are signs of a scam. The same page advises consulting an attorney if foreclosure is imminent or legal papers have been served, which marks the point where a missed payment becomes a legal deadline.
ICE’s September First Look will show whether the calendar explanation for August holds. If the 3.53 percent rate stays near that level while the serious delinquency rate stays near its 1.03 percent pre-pandemic average, the story of this report is the 574,000 seriously delinquent loans and the 0.64 percent prepayment rate, not the headline rate. The 17-month low in payoffs is the figure most directly tied to the 7.28 percent rate that new borrowers now face.
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This article was produced with AI assistance and reviewed by The Money Overview’s editorial team.
