Lender Processing Services (LPS) issued a report Tuesday which puts the number of mortgages that are delinquent or in foreclosure at 6,538,000.

The company’s assessment is based on mortgage performance statistics derived from its loan-level database of nearly 40 million mortgage loans through the end of July.

The grand total of past-due mortgages has risen by nearly 190,000 loans over the past two months. In June, LPS’ tally of loans at least 30 days delinquent or in foreclosure was 6,452,000. In May it was 6,350,000.

LPS says the national delinquency rate — loans that are at least 30 days past due but not yet in foreclosure – rose to 8.34 percent as of the end of July. That’s up 2.4 percent from June but down 10.4 percent from July 2010.

According to the company’s latest report, 4.11 percent of the nation’s outstanding mortgages were part of the foreclosure inventory at July month-end.

The foreclosure inventory rate – which LPS calculates as loans that have been referred to an attorney but have not yet reached the final stage of foreclosure sale – increased 0.4 percent from June, and is up 9.7 percent from a year earlier.

Of the 6,538,000 mortgages going unpaid in July, LPS says 2,156,000 were in the process of foreclosure.

The remaining 4,382,000 were 30 or more days past due but the lender had not yet initiated foreclosures. Of these, 1,899,000 were 90-plus days delinquent.

According to LPS’ study, the states with highest percentage of non-current loans – which combines foreclosures and delinquencies – include: Florida, Mississippi, Nevada, New Jersey, and Illinois.

States with the lowest percentage of non-current loans include: Montana, Wyoming, Alaska, South Dakota, and North Dakota.