First American Core Logic announced that more than 8.3 million U.S. home mortgages had negative equity as of year-end, compared with 7.6 million just three months earlier.  Another 2.2 million mortgaged owner-occupied properties have homes worth only about 5% more than their debt, so they are approaching negative equity as home values slide. More than 20% of all mortgaged properties nationwide are underwater, with more owed on their mortgage loans than the homes are worth, according to a report being released today.   Borrowers are having a difficult time qualifying for a FHA refinance loans or cash refinancing for debt consolidation.

About one-third of homes nationwide are owned outright, and they were not included in the statistics. The near-negative equity homes, combined with the underwater homes, account for a full quarter of all U.S. mortgaged properties, the research company said. The numbers are ominous because negative equity is half of the formula that usually leads to foreclosure.  “Being underwater is a necessary but not sufficient condition for home loan default and foreclosure,” said Mark Fleming, chief economist for First American in Washington, D.C. “The other necessary but insufficient condition is inability to make your mortgage payment due to job loss, divorce, a significant change in the payment because of an adjustable interest rate mortgage. The new loan modification plans are more aggressive with incentives for lenders to renegotiate the principal amount owed on the property.

Over the past year, the total value of U.S. homes has fallen $2.4 trillion, going from $21.5 trillion in December 2007 to $19.1 trillion at the end of 2008. California, where more than $1.2 trillion of housing value evaporated last year, accounted for half that decline. That’s vastly disproportionate to California’s share of the mortgage market, estimated to be 16% to 20%, Fleming said.  However, despite the steep declines, California overall is in better shape than some neighboring states because it still has a stock of mortgages taken out over two decades ago on homes that now have accumulated significant equity. On average, Californians with mortgages have 30% equity in their homes. By comparison, the average equity for all homes that still have mortgages in Nevada is just 3% – the worst in the nation. “Las Vegas is a city that exploded over the past 10 years,” Fleming said. Now that values have tumbled, “the last 10 years is a do-over.”