Chase Mortgage, also known as JPMorgan Chase has joined Countrywide and GMAC by now offering mortgage loan modifications.  According to the Associated Press, last week, Chase loss and mitigation department said it is launching a new program to reduce the number of home foreclosures it undertakes The mortgage loan bank will not put any homes into foreclosure for the next 90 days while it implements the foreclosure prevention program, which is expected to help as many as 400,000 borrowers with about $70 billion in loans.

The modification program will also be offered to customers of Washington Mutual, which JPMorgan Chase recently acquired, and EMC, which was a mortgage unit of Bear Stearns Cos. and bought by JPMorgan in February, according to the AP. The program is apparently designed to help rework multiple mortgages, instead of going through time-consuming case-by-case reviews.  Since 2007, the Chase has modified about $40 billion in mortgage loans which have helped about 250,000 homeowners.

JPMorgan’s latest, expanded plan calls for setting up 24 regional counseling centers, hiring 300 additional loan counselors, creating new home financing alternatives, reaching out to borrowers with prequalified loan modification terms, and a new process to review each loan before it enters foreclosure. Also, when JPMorgan bought Washington Mutual and EMC, it acquired many home mortgages that were called option-ARM loans that featured adjustable interest rates that allowed the borrower choose whether to pay the full mortgage loan payment or less than the interest that was due. The mortgage restructuring program will eliminate that option.

As part of a legal settlement, Bank of America has said it will start a loan modification program on Dec. 1 that is expected to cover about 400,000 loans held by Countrywide Financial Corp.  The FDIC has had some success with its loan modification program since taking over IndyMac Bancorp over the summer, which may have influenced JPMorgan’s program.  Plans for regional counseling centers, hiring additional loan counselors, and dumping those pick-a-payment options sound like a good start, even if they are a little bit late. Do you think the bank’s efforts will make a difference, or just delay the inevitable?