Foreclosures in California Reaches a Zenith
Foreclosures in California reached a new high with banks taking over properties with a renewed effort. In April, foreclosure notices were issued to 96,560 homeowners in California. This means that one in each 138 homes has been foreclosed, which is a 42 per cent jump from a year earlier.
The federal government had earlier imposed a moratorium on foreclosures but this ban was lifted in March. Since then, banks had been pounding on the doors of defaulters. Small wonder, then foreclosures are at an all time high and they are expected to increase in the days to come. The banks are however, taking a precaution so as not to release too many foreclosed homes into the market, thereby crashing prices. There is no point in saturating the market with foreclosed spaces, says Delores Conway, director of the Casden Real Estate Economics Forecast
The situation has assumed alarming proportions with the rising job losses. The unemployment rate in the region is about 12 per cent. President Obama’s stimulus package has had little effect so far in this region. This loan modification package will not have much of an impact in California because not many residents will even make the grade here.
Los Angeles registered 20,564 foreclosures – a jump of 51.65 percent from a year earlier. Foreclosures were the highest in the San Gabriel Valley. Foreclosures were the highest in Pomona (506), Whittier (444), and West Covina (233). Arcadia (32), Sierra Madre (5) and San Marino (2) registered the least number of foreclosures.
In many California cities, there was actually a drop in foreclosure activity. Covina (11.2 percent), Duarte (23.19 percent), Monrovia (16.95 percent), and Pasadena (18.91 percent), were some of them. The only good news amongst this gloom was that foreclosures had come down by 10 per cent since March. Martha Calder, a Coldwell Banker Alliance Realtor in Hacienda Heights says that there is less of foreclosure activity because many homeowners are selling their homes even at a lower price than their mortgage amount so as not to go into foreclosures.
The average price for which a foreclosed home is selling is $200,000, which is 2.72 per cent less from what it was last April. More than 342,000 households across the nation received a foreclosure filing in April. This is the highest since foreclosures began on a renewed spate since January. Real estate developers see this as a great opportunity to buy provided of course, one has a job.
