West Valley Cowering Under Foreclosures

It is the new houses that came up in the West Valley during the housing frenzy that are now worst hit by foreclosures. Phoenix’s top ten metro foreclosure offenders are on the west side of the Valley according to reports released by Arizona Republic. For the past 13 months a study has been conduction from Information Market. Tolleson ranked first with 66 out of every 1,000 residents being slapped with a foreclosure notice. Cave Creek in the northeast valley and Queen Creek in the southeast were the other areas outside the West Valley to rank among the top for the highest foreclosure listings.

Some of the most affordable new houses are in the West Valley. During the housing boom of 2004 and 2005 the prices shot up. Buyers over reached themselves to get into those houses, availed of sub-prime mortgages and are now boiling in the foreclosure cauldron, commented Jay Butler, the director of realty studies from Morrison School, Arizona State University Polytechnic. It is apprehended that the future too looks bleak and the problem is likely to persist.
In February the foreclosures in the valley increased as more and more people lagged behind their mortgage dues. In January 2,250 houses had been foreclosed – 200 more than January. In metro Phoenix in 2007 there had been only 365 foreclosures.

According to numbers released by Mortgage Bankers Association of America in 2007 there were 16.2% of the house owners under the cloud of foreclosures. It showed a 3 % increase during three months. However Arizona is below the national rate. Recent researches have been conducted by W.P. Carey School of Business. According to its findings Avondale, Buckeye, Goodyear, Surprise and Queen Creek have two or three times higher foreclosure figures than the Valley and its adjacent regions. Another survey shows that there are localities in the new West Valley suburbs where there are many foreclosed units on one single street. Houses had been snapped up by investors during the housing boom when loans were easy to get thanks to the sub-prime route. But they never occupied these houses for they were basically speculators. The worst hit are the genuine home builders who are desperately trying to cling on to houses that are their homes.

Many steps have been taken at all levels but unfortunately none has so far showed any positive results. Much more has to be done.