Foreclosure Recap – Week #34
For a change we are going to start things off with some good uplifting news. It seems that foreclosures in the state of New Jersey might just be going down or at the very least stabilizing to some degree. The numbers for the month July 2009 are actually a nearly six percent lower than the numbers for the month of July 2008. The amount of new foreclosures was almost even with the numbers form the month of June 2009 and the combination of those two things have people hopeful that the worst of the real estate crisis might actually be behind us at this point. While it might be a little too soon to actually make a prediction about that, the numbers as outlined in this article tend to leave the reader with some hopeful outlooks on the situation.
According to the Washington Times, the sale of homes is up for the fourth month in a row. This is the first time that can be said since the year 2004, which is yet another positive indicator that the real estate market might at the very least be leveling off and possibly even starting a slight reversal. In fact in a direct quote from the article it says – “The trend signals that the housing market, decimated by the longest and deepest economic downturn since the Great Depression, is finally beginning to recover.” Those are fairly strong words and if true is certainly cause for the nation to begin chilling an appropraite bottle of bubbly for the celcbration.
The historic Boulder Dam Hotel in Boulder City Nevada has recently fallen as a victim of the foreclosure problem but thanks to an anonymous donor has been spared. The city prefers to shy away from the traditional Nevada fare and banned casinos and in fact only allows 120 building permits per year in an effort to try and slow the onset of progress and growth in the community. The story is a nice little sidetrack with a happy wending and one that might be worth a few moments of your time to review.
Las Vegas is the city with the highest foreclosure numbers in the country. An honor it has held for 32 months. To most people that is a sign that they should pack up and leave and many people have done just that. There are signs of the city and the economy falling apart everywhere that you look. But this article from Time Magazine puts a different slant on the issue and if you take the time to read it you will see why to some people this is the perfect time to invest in owning a piece of Sin City and hunker down and wait for the rising of the Phoenix that will no doubt happen.
From the Dairy State of Wisconsin comes the story from the Rock County city of Janesville about how unemployment and job loss has increased the number of bankruptcy filings there. A large number of folks actually filed chapter 13 – where they keep the assets and repay the debt over time only to lose the job and having to re-file the bankruptcy as chapter 7 where all assets are liquidated to pay off the outstanding debt. As a direct result the foreclosure rate goes up as these people walk away from the houses they were attempting to save in the Chapter 13 case. The bad news is that the officials here expect that the numbers are going to continue to get worse.
One side effect of the process of foreclosure that many times people forget to consider since they are so caught up in the numbers game and the actual process of foreclosure is depression. In recent studies nearly half of the people facing foreclosure show signs of depression and a full 37 percent met the screening criteria to be categorized as being in major depression. This can and will have a serious and long reaching effect on those folks both medically and emotionally so the end result of this economic crisis might not be fully realized for a long time to come.
If you are concerned about the foreclosure crisis – and who is not – and you would like to get a better scope and feeling for how things are fairing in your particular piece of the world you can check out this story. It gives a lot of data plus a link to a map that will show you via a Google map where the various foreclosures in your area are located so you can see how close to home the crisis is hitting.
The lender Citi-group has stepped up its efforts to help borrowers who have fallen behind on mortgage payments. The number of people that are 90 days late or more on mortgages has risen from 3.9 percent to 4.7 percent in the first quarter of the year and the financial giant in the industry is trying to do what it can to reach out to people in an effort to try and stem the increase in the foreclosure numbers and keep people in the homes and keep the homes from becoming a bank owned liability that they will have to lose more money on. It is a winning situation for both parties if it works.
The Fox News Station in Tampa is running and article about the various scams that people are still falling for in desperation to attempt to save the family home. A lot of people are being contacted by companies and are being told to make the payments direct to them and they will take care of dealing with the lender and getting the lender to agree to take less or whatever to save the house. There are a lot of different things that these people do to try and assure you that they can save your house when no one else can. This is an outright lie and a scam and yet people still fall for it because they are out of options. The story is here:
The offices of the Housing and Urban Development which are better known in the real estate arena as HUD, has set aside some fifty million dollars earmarked for the states and local governments in an effort to help them deal with the rising amount of foreclosed properties that are beginning to blight the landscape around the cities. This money is designed to help do everything from improve the landscape to give the needed capitol to tear down some of the more unsightly property and make it once again something that might be useable and not just an eyesore on the neighborhoods of America. You can take the time to click into this story and peruse it at:
