Foreclosures Flaring Up, or Flaming Out?
June 9, 2015 1:30 PM
Foreclosures might seem like yesterday's news, but banks are still busy with the cleanup phase of the housing crisis. The situation is producing some herky-jerky housing statistics, and prompting calls for more reforms in states like New York still suffering from stalled dockets and blight.
Foreclosure Starts Rose This Spring ...
Foreclosure starts jumped 18% in March, from February, to 94,100, and were up 7% from a year earlier, according to RealtyTrac. Starts had been relatively flat for the past year but have recently risen across all investor categories, in judicial and nonjudicial states and among all stages of delinquency.
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... And Repossessions Followed
Bank repossessions hit a 27-month high in April at 45,168, up 50% from a year earlier, according to RealtyTrac. Still, the nation's foreclosure inventory fell 26% in March to 782,000 from a year earlier, according to Black Knight Financial.
New York's Lawsky Derides Backlog
Benjamin Lawsky, poised to step down soon as New York's chief banking regulator, recently called his state's foreclosure process "badly broken and in need of change." Foreclosures in New York take an average of 900 days, creating a backlog in court dockets, a burden on municipalities to maintain vacant properties and an impediment to a normal recovery, he said.
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Zombie Properties Won't Die
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is trying to push through legislation in the next month to protect communities from "zombie" properties. One in every 1,556 New York residential properties was in some stage of the foreclosure process during the month of March, according to RealtyTrac.
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Liquidations on Rise in Florida
Banks are finally starting to liquidate a backlog of foreclosed homes in Florida, one of the hardest hit states in the housing downturn. With so little inventory on the market, banks are reaping much higher prices than in the past, with foreclosures selling for 90% of market value in the first quarter, according to RealtyTrac data.
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It's Not Over Yet: Loan Mods Gone Bad
Distressed borrowers that got loan modifications when activity peaked in 2010 face potential rate resets after five years, which could cause further defaults, the Treasury Department has warned . Many home equity lines of credit also are due to reset this year, a double whammy that could create hardships due to higher payments.
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