Foreclosures Increase Slightly in March, But Maintain Longer Term Downtrend

Despite another month-over-month uptick,rnforeclosures continue to decline on an annual basis and, according to a reportrnfrom CoreLogic today, are now down 52 percent from the peak in 2010.  The company’s National foreclosure Report for March showed that foreclosuresrnincreased 6.2 percent from February to March 2013 but the March activity wasrn15.8 percent below that of one year earlier.</p

Fifty-five thousand foreclosures wererncompleted in March compared to 52,000 in February and 66,000 in Marchrn2012.  By way of comparison, during thernpre-recession years of 2000 to 2006 foreclosures averaged 21,000 per month on arnnational basis.  Since the foreclosurerncrisis began in the fall of 2008 there have been approximately 4.2 millionrnforeclosures and there were 735,000 over the 12 month period ending in March.</p

The states with the highest number ofrnforeclosures over that 12 month period were Florida (103,000), Californiarn(83,000) and Michigan (70,000).  Howeverrnwhen foreclosures are viewed in the context of the number of outstandingrnmortgages Michigan led the nation with one completed foreclosure in the past 12rnmonths for every 19 mortgages followed by Arizona with one in 27 and Florida atrnone in 28.  The national average was onernin 55 mortgages.  </p

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The foreclosure inventory – the numberrnof homes in some stage of foreclosure, currently stands at around 1.1 millionrnhomes, down 23 percent from the 1.5 million homes in foreclosure in March 2012rnand a 1.9 percent monthly decline.  This inventoryrnrepresents 2.8 percent of all mortgaged homes in the U.S. compared to 3.5rnpercent in February 2012 (sic).  This wasrnthe 17^th consecutive month when the inventory declined on an annualrnbasis. </p

Florida leads the states with nearly 9.7rnpercent of its homes in some state of foreclosure followed at a distance by NewrnJersey (7.3 percent) and New York (5.0). rnOf the ten states with the highest percentage of homes in foreclosurernall but two, Nevada and Rhode Island, are states using the judicial foreclosurernprocess.  The lowest foreclosure inventoriesrnby percent are all in sparsely populated states – Wyoming (0.5 percent), Alaskarn(0.7 percent), and North Dakota (0.7 percent).</p

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The inventory has declined in 46 statesrnwith some of the most troubled states, Florida, New York, New Jersey, Illinois,rnand Nevada, experiencing the largest decreases, all in excess of 6 percent. </p

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Anand Naliathambi, president and CEO ofrnCoreLogic said, “For 17 consecutive months, foreclosures have declined yearrnover year across the U.S.  Although wernstill have more than a million homes in some stage of foreclosure, this trend,rncombined with rising home prices, is another signal of a gradually improvingrnhousing market.”

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