All the Real Estate News That’s Fit to RE-Print™
Welcome to our weekly edition of Real Estate Investing News This Week. Here’s the best of this week’s real estate news:
- Foreclosure inventory is down 34%
- Foreclosure “activity” is down 27%
- The housing market is running at 85% of normal
We hope these real estate news items help you stay up-to-date with your real estate investing strategies and inspire some profitable real estate deals for you.
CoreLogic Reports U.S. Foreclosure Inventory Down 34 Percent
—Shadow inventory falls to 1.9 million homes, lowest level since August 2008—
On Tuesday, CoreLogic® released its August National Foreclosure Report with a supplement featuring quarterly shadow inventory data as of July 2013.
According to CoreLogic analysis:
- There were 48,000 completed foreclosures in August of 2013, down from 72,000 in August 2012, a year-over-year decrease of 34 percent.
- Overall residential shadow inventory, as of July 2013, was 1.9 million homes. This was down 22 percent from a year ago and down 38 percent from its peak in 2010.
Foreclosure Highlights:
- The five states with the highest number of completed foreclosures for the 12 months ending in August 2013 were: Florida (111,000), Michigan (60,000), California (58,000), Texas (43,000) and Georgia (40,000). These five states accounted for almost half of all completed foreclosures nationally.
- The five states with the highest foreclosure inventory as a percentage of all mortgaged homes were: Florida (7.9 percent), New Jersey (6.2 percent), New York (4.9 percent), Maine (4.0 percent) and Connecticut (3.9 percent).
Shadow inventory at lowest level in five years.
Shadow Inventory Highlights:
- As of July 2013, shadow inventory was under 2 million properties, representing 3.7 months’ supply or 85 percent of the 2.2 million properties that were seriously delinquent, in foreclosure, or REO.
- Of the fewer than 2 million properties in the shadow inventory, 874,000 properties were seriously delinquent, 661,000 were in some stage of foreclosure, and 318,000 were already in REO.
- The value of shadow inventory was $293 billion as of July 2013, down from $380 billion in July 2012.
Download a copy of the CoreLogic
National Foreclosure Report >>>
See also:
Shadow Inventory Falls to Lowest Level Since August 2008
“Overall residential shadow inventory, as of July 2013, was 1.9 million homes, according to CoreLogic. That’s the lowest shadow inventory tally reported since August 2008.”
September Foreclosure “Activity” Down 27 Percent
Q3 Foreclosure Starts at Seven-Year Low
On Tuesday, RealtyTrac® released its U.S. Foreclosure Market Report™ for September and the third quarter of 2013, which shows foreclosure filings — default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions — were reported on 131,232 U.S. properties in September, a 2 percent increase from the previous month but a 27 percent decrease from a year ago.
September was the 36th consecutive month with an annual decrease in U.S. foreclosure activity, a downward trend that started in October 2010.
High-level findings from the report:
- U.S. foreclosure starts in the third quarter were at a seven-year low. A total of 174,366 U.S. properties started the foreclosure process for the first time during the quarter, down 13 percent from the previous quarter and down 39 percent from a year ago to the lowest level since the second quarter of 2006.
- Third quarter foreclosure starts decreased from a year ago in 38 states including Colorado (down 71 percent), Arizona (down 63 percent), California (down 59 percent), Illinois (down 56 percent), and Florida (down 52 percent).
- Third quarter foreclosure starts increased from a year ago in 11 states, including Maryland (up 259 percent), Oregon (up 252 percent), New Jersey (up 53 percent), Connecticut (up 52 percent), Nevada (up 36 percent), and New York (up 25 percent).
- Third quarter bank repossessions (REO) decreased 24 percent from a year ago but were up 7 percent from the previous quarter. A total of 119,485 U.S. properties were repossessed by lenders in the third quarter, putting the nation on pace for close to half a million total bank repossessions for the year.
Access the complete RealtyTrac
U.S. Foreclosure Market Report >>>
Housing Market Running at 85% of Normal, Pre-Recession Activity
By Tory Barringer
“A new index from First American and the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) suggests that about one in seven housing markets have returned to or surpassed their pre-recessionary levels of activity.
The new Leading Market Index (LMI)….measures employment growth data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, home price appreciation data from Freddie Mac, and single-family housing permit growth from the Census Bureau to measure overall improvements in each market….
According to the association, the index registered a score of 0.85 nationwide, indicating that the national housing market is running at 85 percent of normal activity.”
Mortgage Application Shifts
By David Blitzer
“Applications for mortgages for purchasing a home peaked at the beginning of May as talk of rising interest rates appeared and are now down almost 15% as of October 4th. Even with that decline, the Mortgage Bankers Association index of applications for purchase mortgages is 11% above the level at the end of 2012.
The index of mortgages for refinancing most recent peak was at the end of September 2012 — the previous peak was in 2009. Since last September the index is down 66%.
Over the same time period the share of applications that are for refinancing dropped from 83% to 64%.”