WASHINGTON — Federal banking regulators have reached agreements with the nation’s biggest mortgage lenders to address longstanding complaints that the foreclosure process is unfair to delinquent borrowers trying to stay in their homes.

The settlements with 16 of the nation’s largest mortgage lenders and servicers are aimed at correcting what consumers and consumer groups say are fundamental flaws in the repossession process.

The agreements are the result of a review of bank practices begun last year by the nation’s biggest bank enforcers — the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the Office of Thrift Supervision, the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

The Fed said it believed financial penalties were “appropriate” and that it planned to levy fines in the future.

Under the agreements reached, the lenders and servicers have 45 days to hire an auditor and will “remediate all financial injury to borrowers caused by any errors, misrepresentations, or other deficiencies.” There is no minimum or maximum dollar amount identified.

In the four years since the housing bust, about 5 million homes have been foreclosed upon.

Critics, including Democratic lawmakers in Congress, say the order is too lenient on the lenders. House Democrats introduced legislation Wednesday that would require lenders to perform a series of steps, including an appeals process, before starting foreclosures.