Thursday, April 05, 2007

"‘Unprecedented’ foreclosure activity"

From the Central Valley Business Times:

With the Central Valley leading the way, 5,316 homes were lost to foreclosure sales in March in California, according to figures compiled by Foreclosure Radar, a Discovery Bay-based foreclosure listings and software company.

The homes sold at auction last month represented a 27 percent increase from February and a 264 percent increase in the last six months, the company says. Of the $2 billion worth of properties sold in March, 4,796 went back to the lender after receiving no bids, representing $1.82 billion, it says.

While foreclosure sales are increasing throughout the state, Foreclosure Radar says there are significant regional differences.

Despite considerable news coverage of San Diego foreclosures, San Diego County ranked 15th highest with one foreclosure for every 5,668 residents in March and while Los Angeles easily ranks number one in volume each month, adjusted for population, Los Angeles County ranks 38th with one foreclosure for every 12,182 residents.

The real foreclosure leaders are in the Central Valley, the company says.

Four of the state’s top five counties for foreclosure sales last month, on a per capita basis, are in the Valley.

Sacramento County ranks first with 2,605 residents for every sale. Neighboring San Joaquin County is third, one sale for every 2,872 residents. Yuba County is fourth, at 2,909 residents per sale and Stanislaus County is fifth with 3,597 residents per sale.

Riverside County is second with 2,747 residents for every foreclosure sale, according to the company’s figures.

Foreclosures sold at auction now account for 15 percent of all home sales in California and continue to rise,” says Sean O’Toole, CEO and founder of Foreclosure Radar. “This isn’t just a story about failing subprime lenders and their customers. At the current pace, foreclosures will be a significant part of the real estate economy. A fact which bears close scrutiny even in areas that are not yet affected.”

Foreclosure Radar says it is the only service that tracks the actual auctions of property on a daily basis. It says its data are based on individual sales results at daily foreclosure auctions throughout the state, not estimates or projections.

7 comments:

Unknown said...

can't help but wonder how many people have "given up" because of the main stream media shoving all of this down their throats. Why bother tring to struggle with our payments since we can blame all of this on the mortgage/real estate industry and walk away?

Perfect Storm said...

From a poster on Ben Jones greatest blog ever.

Yahoo has teamed up with RealtyTrac to create a new site dedicated to foreclosures:

http://realestate.yahoo.com/Foreclosures

It’s showing that nationwide there were 569,347 foreclosures available and 16,337 in sales. It looks like banks are just holding on to properties.

Wow do you think this is accurate?

Anonymous said...

Some of the small town developers and builders are also getting their properties repo'ed.

Check out the troubles of Alan Little Custom Homes in SLO County.

http://centralcoasthousingbubble.blogspot.com/

Bakersfield Bubble said...

Noticed the same thing here. Phoenix "custom" Homes in Bakersfield had a NOD filed against them this week.

Perfect Storm said...

darth toll,

I think it is logistics, the ones taking back the property are not geared as of yet to handle the situiation. They are probably barely able to keep pace trying to replace personnel who have left due to the extra work load much less increase staff.

ZINGO77 said...

What do you all think will happen to the prices by Sept 07? Up by __% or down by __%?
zingo77

Perfect Storm said...

Zingo,

Sales in some areas of California are down 50%, lenders are tightening, forelcousres are going through the roof, and mortgage companies are going bankrupt daily now, this spells Trouble my friend with a capital T.

Interesting commentary from Wayne Rogers today on Fox, you might remember him as Trapper John on MASH the TV series, anyway Wayne is a pretty savy investor, he has been in the middle on the housing market the last few months not saying much either way, however today he growled like a bear and said we have a long way to go before this market hits bottom and went as far as to say to the pro housing bitch that she was nuts.

Soon the market will respect those with 20% down and good credit and decent income instead of lumping them in with the anybody who wants to lie about their income and pay exorbitant rates in order to purchase a home that they cannot afford.

This market is going down for the count for a long time.

My prediction 50% from peak by 2009.