“Foreclosure activity dropped to a 36-month low in February asrnallegations of improper foreclosure processing continued to dog the mortgagernservicing industry and disrupt court dockets,” said James J. Saccacio, chiefrnexecutive officer of RealtyTrac. “While a small part of February’s decrease canrnbe attributed to it being a short month and bad weather, the bottom line isrnthat the industry is in the midst of a major overhaul that has severelyrnrestricted its capacity to process foreclosures. We expect to see the numbersrnbounce back, but that will likely take several months. And monthly volume mayrnnever return to its peak in March 2010 of more than 367,000 propertiesrnreceiving foreclosure filings.” </p

The problems associated with foreclosure documentation do not directly impact every step of the process though. There is reason for optimism.   Default notices (NOD LIS) were filed on a total of 63,165 properties in Fenruary, that is a 16 percent declinernfrom January and a 41 percent improvement from a year earlier.  It is also a 48-month low for this category and is 55 percent below the peak in default notices, which occurred in April of 2009.</p

Because many of the issues that have arisen in the foreclosurernprocess were identified in states using a judicial foreclosure process,<bRealtyTrac now breaks out filings by judicial and non-judicial states.  Default notices in judicial states decreasedrn19 percent during the month and 13 percent in non-judicial states.  Year-over-year filings were down 48 and 31rnpercent respectively. </p

Foreclosure auctions (NTS, NFS) were scheduled for the first time on 97,293rnU.S. properties in February, a 10 percent decrease from the previous month andrna 21 percent decrease from February 2010. This represented a 27 month low andrna drop of 38 percent from the peak level reached in March 2010.  Inrnjudicial states these filings were down 7 percent from January and 49 percent fromrna year earlier; in non-judicial states the changes were -11 percent and -7rnpercent. </p

Lenders foreclosed on 64,643 U.S. properties in February, down 17rnpercent from January and down 18 percent from February 2010. These repossessionsrn(REO) were at a 22-month low in February, down 37 percent from their peak ofrn102,134 in September 2010.   In judicial foreclosurernstates bank repossessions decreased 24 percent from January and were down 35rnpercent from February 2010, while bank repossessions in states with arnnon-judicial process decreased 14 percent from January and were down 8 percentrnfrom February 2010.</p

Once again Nevada and Arizona led the country in foreclosurernrates; Nevada for the 50^th straight month.  One in every 119 housing units in the staternreceived a filing in February but this was a 22 percent drop from January and arn13 percent decrease from February 2010.  A total of 9,553 homes received a filingrnduring the month.</p

Arizona had the second highest rate with one in every 178 housing unitsrnreceiving a filing and California was third with one foreclosure touching inrnevery 239 homes.</p

Rounding out the top five were Utah (1:273) and Idaho (1:298).  A notable change: in February Florida droppedrnout of the top five where it has been for many months.  In February it was the state with the 8^{th</suphighest foreclosure rate although it still ranked second nationally in numbersrnof foreclosures.  For the For the secondrnmonth in a row, no Florida cities posted foreclosure rates in the top 20 amongrnU.S. metropolitan areas with a population of 200,000 or more; a distinctrnimprovement from 2010, when the state accounted for nine of the top 20 metrornforeclosure rates.}

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