Virginia foreclosures up 4.1 percent from last year
ALEXA WELCH EDLUND/TIMES-DISPATCH
A foreclosed home on West Franklin Street is on the market for $299,000. In Virginia, 16,687 borrowers struggled to make payments in the third quarter.
Foreclosure activity in Virginia rose 4.1 percent from July through September from the same period a year ago, according to a RealtyTrac report being released this morning.
RealtyTrac also said that foreclosure filings in the state increased 10 percent in September from the same month a year ago but dropped 3.7 percent from August.
The company tracks foreclosure filings, including default notices, auctions and bank repossessions.
In all, 16,687 borrowers in Virginia struggled making mortgage payments, or one in every 196 households, during the third quarter.
Virginia was ranked as having the 16th highest foreclosure rate in the country.
By comparison, one in every 136 U.S. households faced possible foreclosure. Nationally, foreclosure filings were reported on 937,840 properties in the third quarter, up nearly 22.5 percent from the year-earlier period but an increase of only 5 percent from the second quarter.
In September, U.S. filings rose 29.2 percent from the same month a year ago but fell 4.14 percent from August.
"We have seen our inventory spike substantially in the past 60 days," said Brian Liggan, principal broker and owner of Virginia Capital Realty in Richmond.
The firm, which specializes in foreclosed properties, has about 450 listings in central Virginia.
Liggan attributed the recent rise in listings to the lifting of moratoriums earlier this year. The moratoriums were meant to give borrowers more time to work out loan modifications, but they created a glut and, in effect, delayed the inevitable, Liggan said.
Many of the new listings are damaged homes that have been vacant for months.
Nevada, with the nation's highest rate, had one foreclosure filing for every 23 households, nearly six times the national average.
Six states -- Nevada, Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois and Michigan -- accounted for 62 percent of the nation's foreclosure activity in the third quarter.
Contact Carol Hazard at (804) 775-8023 or
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mikeyt,
Thanks for the insight. Was hoping to hear from you on this.
On the larger question, what is your sense of the foreclosure situation here, relative to the chaos in the big six states? When I am out, I retrace the same routes over and over like everyone else, but I don’t see a lot of forclosure signs.
Anon… of the builders who are actually working, about the only builders building more than one home at a time right now are Ryan and Centex. Give you an example—in 2005 there were about 9,000 building permits issued in the Richmond area. The projection for this year is 2,500. Banks won’t make loans to builders, and builders who try to build the smaller homes people want aren’t being allowed to do it by local governments. That’s from the chief economist for the National Assocaition of Realtors, not me.
Builders are putting their businesses in the ground, not stakes.
Up only 4.1 percent from the same time last year! That is an awfully small number, considering foreclosures prior to that were minuscule. With such low year-over-year numbers, no wonder builders are eager to put more stakes in the ground.
This is what happens when the free trade agreement sends all the factory jobs outside the USA.
Is it still controversial that protectionism is harmful?
Anyone that thinks that real estate prices will rebound in the short term is simply delusional. This is the tip of the shadow inventory iceberg. There are legions of seriously defaulted loans for which banks have not initiated foreclosure proceedings.
oneuser -
I agree. Adding to that, the American dream is no longer to buy a home, unless you are very, VERY secure in your employment. We can no longer count on staying on one place forever, and getting job after job in the same area. It makes better sense to rent and have the flexibility to pick-up and move on short notice and not be saddled with a home to sell in an depressed housing market. Yes, you don’t get an equity by renting, but look at the people already upside down anyhow.
This is what happens when the free trade agreement sends all the factory jobs outside the USA.
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