New delinquencies and foreclosure starts continued to fall in January, but increases in foreclosure processing and sales were not enough to offset swelling foreclosure inventories or lengthening foreclosure timelines.
February 28th, 2011Home and Land Foreclosure Listings Impact Property Sales
The high number of properties under residential and land foreclosure listings in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, had a huge impact on real estate sales in the region in 2010. Despite the decline in the percentage of real estate sales accounted for by distressed properties last year, the figure remained high.
Properties under listing of foreclosure in Charlotte and in the rest of Mecklenburg accounted for 17% of the total number of residential properties sold in the area in 2010. A total of 2,160 foreclosed homes were purchased by buyers last year in the county, with the average selling price of foreclosures in the region pegged at $135,956.
February 23rd, 2011Online House Hunting Rises 10 Percent over 2010
In January the number of searches for homes by buyers on the Internet’s largest homes-for-sale site, a potential an indicator of future demand, rose 10 percent over a year ago, a time when large numbers of buyers were getting ready to take advantage of the homebuyer tax credits.
January data from Realtor.com shows that last month year-over-year search activity rose 9.9 percent nationally over January 2010 and from 0.2 percent to 62.5 percent in 114 of the 146 markets the site serves. The top 10 most searched real estate markets in January were: Chicago, IL (1); Detroit, IL (2); Los Angeles-Long Beach, CA (3); Phoenix-Mesa, AZ (4); Las Vegas, NV (5); Dallas, TX (6); Tampa-St. Pet
February 21st, 2011Foreclosures and Distressed Listings Drive Demand for Rentals
According to housing market analysts, the rise in the number of properties falling into foreclosed and distressed listings has escalated demand for apartments and other forms of rental housing in the U.S. The trend is highly evident in metro areas like Seattle, Washington.
The rising number of Seattle foreclosure listings has reportedly scared off most people from homeownership, with most of them thinking that chances for property appreciation will be next to nothing as values of homes continue to tumble.
February 12th, 2011Capping the Mortgage Interest Deduction: Third Time the Charm?
For the third straight year, the Obama Administration has proposed limiting the value of the mortgage interest deduction by limiting the amount that wealthier tax payers can deduct.
In the budget for fiscal year 2012 released today, the MID cuts are presented as a way to pay for a “patch” on the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) by limiting the rate at which high-income earners can itemize tax deductions.
“The President has called on Congress to work with the Administration on corporate tax reform that will simplify the system, eliminate special interest loopholes, level the playing field, and lower the corporate tax rate for the first time in 25 years,” said the Office of Management and Budget today.
The administration has proposed a similar reduction in the impact of the MID during the past two budget cycles. Last year’s budget proposal based deductions on income, effectively eliminating the mortgage interest deduction for single taxpayers making more than $200,000 a year, $250,000 for joint returns.
The cap on itemized deductions, designed to raise nearly $179 billion by increasing taxes on wealthier Americans, mirrored a similar effort in fiscal year 2009. Aggressive
February 7th, 2011Foreclosure Inventories are 7.8 Times above Normal and Rising
A report by Lender Processing Services today confirms Fitch Ratings’ analysis yesterday that the volume of defaulted loans moving to REO status has fallen to a trickle as a consequence of the Robo-gate scandal, contributing to a backlog of foreclosures that threatens to reverse the overall decrease in foreclosure inventory caused by the steady decline in new delinquencies last year.
Even though most moratoria have been lifted, Fitch reported that the flow of defaulted loans into REOs will continue to be slow due to outside scrutiny and servicers’ concerns over legal liability. As a result, Fitch extended its estimate of the time it will take to clear the current inventory of distressed properties to four years. See Robo-gate Will Haunt REO Inventory for Four Years.
LPS said the total number of delinquent loans is nearly twice as high as historical averages – and foreclosure inventory is currently 7.8 times higher than historical averages and is rising. Just