Monday, June 14, 2010

U.S. Home Foreclosures Climb 44% to Record in May

June 10 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. home foreclosures reached a record for the second consecutive month in May, with increases in every state, as lenders stepped up property seizures, according to RealtyTrac Inc.

Bank repossessions climbed 44 percent from May 2009 to 93,777, the Irvine, California-based data company said today in a statement. Foreclosure filings, including default and auction notices, rose about 1 percent to 322,920. One out of every 400 U.S. households received a filing.

“We’re nowhere near out of the woods,” Rick Sharga, RealtyTrac’s senior vice president for marketing, said in a telephone interview. “We’re likely to set a quarterly record for home seizures if June is anything like May.”

Lenders are completing the “inevitable progression” of taking properties from homeowners who stopped paying, Sharga said. He predicted last month that another 5 million delinquent mortgages will end in foreclosure in addition to properties that had already been repossessed.

Almost 3.1 million properties have been seized by banks since April 2005, Daren Blomquist, RealtyTrac’s marketing communications manager, said in an interview today.

“The second quarter won’t be the peak,” Sharga said. “I’m not even sure 2010 will be.”

The previous record for seizures was 92,432 in April. Last month was the first in which every state had an increase in repossessions from a year earlier, according to RealtyTrac.

Unemployment Rate

U.S. private payrolls rose by 41,000 in May, Labor Department data showed last week. The hiring of temporary census workers boosted overall payroll growth to 431,000. The jobless rate fell to 9.7 percent, from 9.9 percent in April.

Almost a quarter of the nation’s mortgage holders owed more than their homes were worth in the first quarter, Zillow.com said last month. Bank sales of foreclosed properties accounted for more than a fifth of all U.S. home transactions in March, the Seattle-based real estate data provider said.

Wells Fargo & Co. and Bank of America Corp., the two largest U.S. home lenders, are cutting principal on some mortgages in an effort to keepwners in properties and get them to pay at least part of what they owe. Bank of America said in March it was reducing principal for some borrowers who owe more than 120 percent of what their homes are worth.

“Marginal people, those types that were working as laborers, are most affected by foreclosures,” said Albert Kyle, a finance professor at the University of Maryland’s R.M. Smith School of Business in College Park. “A lot of foreclosures are occurring in modest houses.”

Default Notices

The number of homes that received default notices last month was 96,462, down 7 percent from April and 22 percent from a year earlier, RealtyTrac said. A default notice is the first stage in the foreclosure process. They peaked at 142,064 in April 2009.

A foreclosure auction, the second stage in the process, was scheduled on 132,681 properties, down 4 percent from April and about 1 percent from May 2009. The record was 158,105, reached in March.

Nevada had the highest foreclosure rate for the 41st straight month. One in every 79 households got a notice, more than five times the national average. Filings fell almost 12 percent from the previous month and 16 percent from May 2009.

Arizona had the second-highest rate, at one in 169 households, or more than twice the U.S. average. Filings fell 5 percent from a year earlier. Florida ranked third at one in 174 households, and California was fourth at one in 186.

Rise in Michigan

Michigan ranked fifth at one in 223 households, with filings up 6 percent from April and 46 percent from a year earlier, RealtyTrac said. Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Utah and Maryland also ranked among the 10 highest rates.

Ten states accounted for more than 70 percent of all U.S. filings, led by California’s 72,030. Filings in the most populous state rose 3 percent from April and declined 22 percent from a year earlier.

Florida ranked second with 50,685 filings, up 5 percent from April and down 14 percent from a year earlier. Michigan was third at 20,322, followed by Arizona at 16,097.

Illinois had 15,061 filings, up 38 percent from a year earlier, and Nevada had 14,346.

Georgia, Texas, Ohio and New Jersey rounded out the top 10, said RealtyTrac, which sells default data from more than 2,200 counties representing 90 percent of the U.S. population.

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Tuesday, June 8, 2010

May Home-Buying Activity Looks Worse Than Expected

By James R. Hagerty and Nick Timiraos

How will housing sales fare without the benefit of big tax breaks for home buyers? The early indications are that sales are down very sharply in recent weeks, worse than most brokers and analysts expected.

Of course, economists and real estate analysts expected home sales to slow after the tax credit, of as much as $8,000, expired at the end of April. But early data from real estate brokers indicate that the sales declined as much as 25% to 30 from the year-earlier levels in some markets.

Without the tax bait, “consumers just don’t have that same sense they have to move quickly,” said Patrick Lashinsky, CEO of ZipRealty Inc., a big brokerage firm.

The May slump is ominous, but it’s too early to tell whether it portends another serious downward lurch in a market that has generally been leveling off over the past year.

Despite the recent drop in mortgage rates to less than 5%, applications for home-purchase mortgages have fallen in each of the last four weeks. In late May they were down nearly 40% from a month before, reaching their lowest level in 13 years, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.

Even the Realtors are acknowledging that things look dicey. Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, estimated that contracts signed for home resales in May were down 20% to 30% from a year earlier. He expects June and July to remain fairly weak and will be watching nervously for signs of a rebound in August or September. “Housing cannot just depend on [government] stimulus forever,” Mr. Yun said.

Home-purchase contracts signed in New Jersey last month were down 25% from a year earlier, estimates Otteau Valuation Group, an appraisal firm in East Brunswick, N.J. New Jersey’s state legislature is considering its own tax credit for home buyers.

In the Minneapolis area, the number of newly signed home-purchase contracts in the week ended May 22 was down 30% from a year earlier, according to the Minneapolis Area Association of Realtors. “Our buyers, if they haven’t purchased, have just decided to wait,” said Brad Fisher, president of the local Realtor group.

In the Phoenix area, contracts signed in May plunged 26% from a year earlier, local Realtor data show. In Denver, the drop was 27%. Northwest Multiple Listing Service, which covers 21 counties in Washington state, including the Seattle area, reported Friday that contracts signed in May also were down 27% in its region.

In another sign of weak sales, the number of homes on the market is growing again. ZipRealty said the number of homes listed for sale in 26 major metro areas across the U.S. in May was up 1.7% from April. In a typical May, the inventory doesn’t increase from April, according to Ivy Zelman, chief executive of Zelman & Associates, a research firm.

Adding to some of the static over where housing is headed: buyers that signed contracts by April 30 have until the end of June to close on those properties and receive the $8,000 tax credit. That means actual sales volumes in May and June could continue to show strength, even though new sales activity has already fallen. The drop-off in activity might not show up in closed sales figures until July.

Some markets haven’t suffered much from the loss of tax credits. An $8,000 credit doesn’t go far in most of Manhattan, where home prices start near $1 million, and so the Big Apple could see less of a lull. “Now people seem to feel it’s okay to spend some money,” said Pamela Liebman, CEO of Corcoran Group, a big broker in Manhattan.

California’s state tax credit of as much as $10,000, which ends Dec. 31, has helped sustain sales there. Contracts signed in May in the Los Angeles region were up 16% from a year earlier (but down 9% from April), while San Diego was down 3% from year-ago levels. San Francisco’s East Bay was up 2%, while the Napa Valley region posted a 15% gain from one year ago (but a 14% month-over-month decline).

In Florida’s Miami-Dade County, home-sale contracts signed in May were up nearly 5% from a year earlier, according to EWM Realtors. Many buyers in Miami are foreigners attracted by huge price cuts there over the past couple of years, said Patrick O’Connell, a senior vice president at EWM.

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Sunday, June 6, 2010

Foreclosures Rise in Commercial Property---and Single Family Homes

According to new data from Real Capital Analytics, the
default rate for commercial real estate loans owned by the
nation’s FDIC-insured banks increased from 3.83 percent in
the fourth quarter of 2009 to 4.17 percent in the first
quarter of 2010.

Real Capital says this is the highest default rate reported
since 1992, the first year for which data is available, when
it was 4.55 percent. Year-over-year, the default rate is up
by 192 basis points. By contrast, at its cyclical low in the
first half of 2006, the commercial mortgage default rate was
0.58 percent.

As of the first quarter of this year, $45.5 billion of
bank-held commercial mortgages were in default, according to
Real Capital’s tally.
The research firm segregates multifamily apartment loans
from the broader category of commercial mortgages, which
includes hotel, office, retail, and industrial. In the first
quarter of this year, the default rate on multifamily
mortgages held by banks hit 4.62 percent, up from 4.41
percent the previous quarter, and the highest level on
record going back to 1992. In total, $9.9 billion of
bank-held multifamily mortgages were in default last
quarter.

A separate study released this week by Trepp LLC shows that
the share of past due loans held by investors in commercial
mortgage-backed securities (CMBS), including those already
in foreclosure and REO, jumped 40 basis points in May to
8.42 percent – the highest in the history of the CMBS
industry.

For seven of the last eight months, the rate of increase in
CMBS delinquencies has been between 37 and 49 basis points
in Trepp’s study. The only exception was February of this
year when the delinquency rate nudged up only 22 basis
points.
To put the delinquent CMBS universe into perspective, Trepp
says that just six months ago, the delinquency rate was 5.65
percent. One year ago, it was 2.77 percent.

The risk assessment and analytics firm notes that results
were mixed across the varying property types. In May, the
industrial sector was the only one to post a decline in CMBS
delinquencies, dropping from 3.44 percent in April to 3.34
percent. Hotel delinquencies claimed the biggest jump, up
129 basis points to top out above 18 percent.

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Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Mortgage delinquencies surge to a record

The number of homeowners either in default or at risk of foreclosure will have a broader effect on the overall economic recovery. More than 10% of homeowners have missed at least one payment during the January-March timeframe. That double-digit number represents a new high, up from 9.1% a year ago. The biggest factor in that high number is the amount of borrowers who missed three months of payments. In total, 4.3 million Americans are at risk of losing their homes. One encouraging figure is the number of homeowners just starting to show trouble is decreasing, down .3%. Many agree that the government's $75 billion foreclosure prevention program barely made a dent in the overall problem. The scariest part of all this? Homeowners with good credit who took out conventional, fixed-rate loans are now the fastest growing group of foreclosures - accounting for nearly 37% of all new foreclosures,up from 29 percent a year ago.

Economic woes, such as unemployment or reduced income, are the main catalysts for foreclosures this year. Initially, lax lending standards were the culprit. But homeowners with good credit who took out conventional, fixed-rate loans are now the fastest growing group of foreclosures. earlier.

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Monday, May 24, 2010

Commercial Property Values Turn Negative

Commercial Property Values Turn Negative Again

By: Carrie Bay
4/23/2010

Commercial real estate prices appeared to be stabilizing
toward the end of last year, but a new study shows price
declines have returned. Moody’s Investors Service reported
this week that its index for commercial property values fell
2.6 percent in February. It was the first decline recorded
by the company in four months.

The drop pushes the Moody’s/REAL Commercial Property Price
Indices (CPPI) 42 percent below their October 2007 peak. The
ratings agency says commercial real estate values are down
26 percent compared to just a year ago.

“From November to January, commercial real estate prices
increased by an aggregate 6.3 percent,” said Nick Levidy,
managing director at Moody’s. “As noted in our previous
reports, however, we did not feel that these increases were
sustainable in the short term, particularly given current
low transaction volumes. With continued low volume in
February and a larger proportion of repeat-sales sales
considered distressed, it is unsurprising that prices have
once again headed lower.”

According to Moody’s report, while interest in high-quality
properties appears to be picking up, transaction activity in
the core of the commercial real estate market remains
muted.

Overall, transaction volume declined from January to
February by 10 percent as measured by dollars, and by nearly
30 percent in the number of deals. The CPPI calculation
included 66 repeat sales totaling roughly $540 million.

The share of distressed sales in Moody’s repeat-sales
database has increased significantly over the last couple of
years. In 2008, just 4 percent of resales were identified as
distressed. That figure jumped to nearly 20 percent in early
2009, and in February of this year, constituted nearly
one-third at 32 percent.

Moody’s says the stark high-low split in the market when it
comes to property quality, together with the effect of
distressed sales on overall price levels, will likely cause
markets to bounce up and down over the near term.
“We do not expect prices to establish a clear trend until
volume picks up and market-clearing prices are established
for distressed properties,” the ratings agency said.

Saturday, May 22, 2010

Mortgages in Foreclosure Hit New High in Q1

Mortgages in Foreclosure Hit New High in Q1: MBA
05/19/2010 By: Carrie Bay


The percentage of home loans making their way through the foreclosure process jumped to a new record high during the first quarter of 2010, the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) reported Wednesday.

Despite the industry’s, and the government’s, all-out attack on the nation’s foreclosure problem, MBA’s regular quarterly study showed that 4.63 percent of outstanding mortgages were in foreclosure at the end of March. The first quarter foreclosure rate rose from 4.58 percent at the end of 2009. The foreclosure inventory rate this time last year was 3.85 percent.

MBA’s delinquency calculations also demonstrate a continuing upward trend. The percentage of homeowners with a mortgage who were behind on their payments but

not yet in foreclosure last quarter jumped to 10.06 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis. The national delinquency rate was 9.47 percent at the close of 2009 and 9.12 percent at the end of the first quarter of last year.

According to MBA, the latest quarterly upsurge in past due loans was the result of increases in delinquencies for prime, subprime, and Veteran Affairs (VA) loans.

The trade group’s data show that 3.27 percent of outstanding mortgages were 30 days overdue in Q1, 3.39 percent were at least 90 days past due, and lenders initiated new foreclosure actions on 1.37 percent.

Together, loans that have gone unpaid for 90 days and those in foreclosure – the ones classified as seriously delinquent – account for 68 percent of all non current mortgages in MBA’s study.

Jay Brinkmann, MBA’s chief economist, said, “Overall, we see a continuation of the pattern of declines in short-term delinquency rates, the continued historically high share of delinquencies that are 90 days or more past due, and a leveling off in the pace of foreclosures.”

Brinkmann candidly summed up his organization’s many pages of statistical findings with, “If mortgage delinquencies are not yet clearly improving, it also appears they are not getting worse. However, a bad situation that is not getting worse is still bad.”

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502-969-1801

Saturday, May 15, 2010

Freddie Mac Looking for Money

NEW YORK, May 14 (Reuters) - Freddie Mac (FRE.N) said Friday it plans to sell $2.5 billion of reference bills on Monday.
The scheduled offerings are:
-- $500 million of one-month bills due June 14, 2010 to be sold Monday and settle Tuesday; and
-- $1.0 billion of three-month bills due Aug. 16, 2010 to be sold Monday and settle Tuesday; and
-- $1.0 billion of six-month bills due Nov. 15, 2010 to be sold Monday and settle Tuesday.
The bills will be sold over the Internet in a Dutch auction. In such uniform price auctions, successful bidders pay only the price of the lowest accepted bid rather than the actual price as in a conventional multiple-price auction.
Bids will be accepted from authorized dealers from 8:00 a.m. until 9:45 a.m. (Reporting by Caryn Trokie, Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)

What does mean to Joe Q. Public?

It Means foreclosure mess will be around a while, they need money to fund the others that are coming in...

If your worried about foreclosure American Eagle Realty can help you with solid answers about your rights and options before your house is foreclosed on! We are experts in the Short Sale Process and have the experience needed to work with your bank! Contact us we can help.....

American Eagle Realty
www.american-eagle-realty.com
502-969-1801