The latest foreclosed homes by state data showed Indiana experiencing an increase in foreclosures despite the improved condition of the economy. The data also showed that for every 536 households in the state, one has received a notice of foreclosure for the month of March 2010.

Housing market data indicated that southern counties are faring better than the rest of the state, but foreclosure listings, including fixer upper home listings and bank owned properties; continue to rise in numbers as shown by state records for the first half of 2010.

In an effort to stymie the pace of foreclosure, free workshops will be held all around the state. The 11 workshops will address issues related to bank owned property listing and distress properties and will also provide advice to state residents on how to deal with foreclosures. The events will be held in Workone facilities.

Aside from the workshops, state officials have also launched a program which utilizes the court system of Indiana to battle foreclosure expansion. These efforts were launched following the less-than-successful implementation of a state law in 2009 which provided homeowners facing foreclosures with the right to have a settlement conference with their lenders. However, as of the end of 2009, less than two percent of eligible homeowners have taken advantage of this state law.

The workshops and other programs designed to control rising foreclosure rates will be implemented in the whole state of Indiana. However, implementation of these programs will be done gradually, with authorities using certain counties as springboard before launching a state-wide coverage.

In the case of the workshops, the events will be held across the whole state, with Southern Indiana being the last stop for these conferences. State authorities have stated that although southern counties are performing better than other areas of the state, southern homeowners would still experience the workshops and would have a chance to discuss problems related to bank owned property listing and other foreclosure concerns.

Free Workshops Address Bank Owned Property Listing Problems in Indy is a post from: News of Foreclosures - Read more about how does foreclosure work.

A total of 127 households in Saint Clair County received foreclosure notices and another 114 households in Madison County were hit with filings, slightly down from the previous month.

The two counties have been surpassing the 100-unit level every month in 2009, and the trend has not changed considerably, but local realtors are hopeful that the local foreclosure trend will follow the declining national trend.

According to the Mortgage Bankers Association, the nationwide default rate for residential mortgages fell significantly to an adjusted 9.47-percent rate in the October-December quarter, marking a drop of 17 percentage points from the default rate in the July-September quarter.

Carolyn Kemp, spokesperson for the MBA, said that the decline in the default rate was largely driven by a substantial decline in mortgages delinquent by 30 days.

Kemp also explained that the mortgage delinquency decline in the final quarter of 2009 was significant because typically, the final-quarter default rate shoots up as additional expenses during the holidays, in addition to higher heating costs, force homeowners to delay their monthly loan payments. She also said that a declining trend may be in the offing.

The MBA also reported that the number of properties entering distressed houses listings in Illinois dropped to 1.53 percent of all mortgage loans in the October-December quarter. These are properties for which the foreclosure process was started.

However, the number of delinquent mortgages has increased, with over 11 percent of all mortgage loans in default in the final quarter last year. The number of completed foreclosures also increased to five percent of all home loans in the state.

According to Mary Schaefer, communications director for the Illinois Association of Realtors, the resolution of the foreclosure crisis will depend on job creation and on the willingness of banks to refinance and make home loans. She added that unemployment have been impacting the local housing market significantly.

In Saint Clair and in Madison, home sales have been falling during the winter, with only 103 homes sold in January, according to the Realtor Association of Southwestern Illinois. The sales figure marked a 39-percent decrease from sales in December 2009.

Meanwhile, Deb Campbell, president of the Southwestern association, said that the pace of distressed houses listings will slow down further as more homeowners and buyers take advantage of federal and state programs designed to prevent foreclosure and to facilitate home ownership.

Distressed Houses Listings Declined in Southwestern Illinois is a post from: News of Foreclosures - Read more about how does foreclosure work.

In January this year, foreclosure postings in Manatee County, Florida climbed up to 1,144, a staggering 150-percent increase from filings in January 2009. The sharp increase prompted analysts to think that the predicted wave of foreclosures this year might begin earlier.

In Sarasota County, filings jumped by 20 percent compared to a year ago to 1,219 and in Charlotte County, filings climbed up by 44 percent from January last year to 761. Both figures, however, marked a decline in filings compared to the previous month.

The three counties were among the worst performing Florida markets in terms of foreclosure rate in January, with Charlotte ranking fifth, Manatee ranking eighth and Sarasota ranking 14th among the 67 counties of Florida.

Sean Snaith, an economist at the University of Central Florida, has been predicting further increases in foreclosures over the past months because of the unemployment situation.

Another analyst pointing to unemployment as the main culprit for the surge in bank owned properties this year is Lewis Goodkin, head of Goodkin Consulting in Miami. He said that the housing market in Southwest Florida will not recover or stabilize fully until 2012 because of the challenges that must be overcome to improve the employment rate.

Statewide, total foreclosure notices in January dropped from December to 47,069, but they marked a 15-percent jump compared to January 2009 filings. Florida had almost the same foreclosure rate as California, which was one unit in every 187 residential units.

Two Florida metro areas were among the ten most foreclosure-battered areas in January. Ninth-ranking Cape Coral area posted a foreclosure pace of one unit in every 121 while tenth-ranking Orlando posted a rate of one unit out of every 143.

Real estate professional Michael Moulton, who specializes in high-end properties, said that foreclosures will increase in affluent neighborhoods. He added that he has just closed a real estate sale involving a $1.7 million repossessed home, which was listed for $3 million during the boom.

In the meantime, other resourceful and cash-rich investors are taking advantage of the rise in foreclosures. They buy bank owned properties in bulk numbers and then resell them fast at bargain prices. In Manatee, condo units purchased at bulk prices are being sold off at only $140,000 each, far below their original $435,000 price range.

Bank Owned Properties Still Soaring in Manatee Area is a post from: News of Foreclosures - Read more about how does foreclosure work.

Throughout 2009, a total of 62,775 foreclosure actions were filed in the state, far above the 48,698 foreclosures filed in 2008 and the 23,000 filings in 2006.

As the unemployment rate soared to 10.1 percent in December – higher than the nationwide jobless rate – more residents of New Jersey were forced into default and foreclosure.

The biggest rates of foreclosure increase in the state occurred in the counties of Bergen and Atlantic, with increase rates of 48 percent and 55 percent, respectively. The smallest rates of increase were in the counties of Essex and Cumberland, with increase rates of 12 percent and 11 percent, respectively.

Although not all foreclosure filings move on to foreclosure sales, as many distressed homeowners try their best to rescue their homes, a big portion of delinquency filings ultimately end up in lists of bank owned houses.

According to a report released by the U.S. Treasury Department, over 28,000 homeowners with home loans in New Jersey applied for loan modifications under the Obama administration’s foreclosure prevention program. But as of December last year, only 2,027 borrowers were able to have their mortgages modified permanently.

Meanwhile, based on records from the state Foreclosure Mediation Program, over 1,300 distressed homeowners were assisted to negotiate repayment arrangements with their lenders and about 50 percent were able to delay foreclosure proceedings. But analysts contend that job losses will bring most of these temporarily rescued mortgages into eventual foreclosure.

In a separate report released by a foreclosure tracking company based in California, the total number of residential units hit with foreclosure petitions in 2009 in New Jersey was 63,208, representing 1.8 percent of all housing units in the state. Foreclosure activity in 2009 stepped up by 1.1 percent from 2008 and by more than 103 percent from 2007.

Compared with other states, New Jersey was tenth in number of filings and was 14th in foreclosure rate. More than 2.8 million residential units across the U.S. were hit with foreclosure notices in 2009.

In December 2008, the jobless rate in New Jersey was only 6.8 percent. With a 10.1-percent jobless rate in December 2009, it is no wonder that bank owned properties grew in number last December.

Bank Owned Houses in New Jersey Rose As Job Loss Grew is a post from: News of Foreclosures - Read more about how does foreclosure work.

But this time around, the next wave of foreclosures will include homeowners who were creditworthy but were forced to go into foreclosures because of some mitigating circumstances, foremost of which is job loss.

Industry experts said that the pace of property sales will remain low, until some improvements could be seen on the job market. They do not expect the unemployment rate to go up until mid-2010.

They added that even if the unemployment rate tapered off, property prices are not expected to go up significantly because of the large number of repo houses listings. They predicted that home prices will return to their normal average increase by 2013.

There is a consensus in the housing industry that the job market needs to improve substantially for it to achieve a significant recovery.

Many industry experts are anticipating further declines in home prices. But some experts believed that home prices have bottomed out, helped by demand from first-time homebuyers and investors. However, they expect prices in some housing markets to continue to drop, such as Manhattan.

The federal government has been aggressive in its effort to help the housing market recover fast. It has launched several programs that it hopes will help distressed homeowners save their properties from foreclosures. One of the programs gives incentives to lenders to encourage them to workout solutions with troubled homeowners by providing loan modifications.

Another program that seems to be successful in reducing the number of foreclosure houses and helping revive the neighborhoods is the $8,000 tax credit given to first-time homebuyers of foreclosure properties. Many potential homebuyers who are holding off buying properties because of economic uncertainties were encouraged to go out and buy houses to take advantage of the tax credit.

The federal government also provided stimulus funds to state and local governments to help restore neighborhoods severely affected by foreclosures. The stimulus funds are used to buy properties on distressed houses listings, renovate and sell them to low and middle-income families.

Unemployment Generate More Foreclosed House Listings is a post from: News of Foreclosures - Read more about how does foreclosure work.

Amherst analysts based their forecast on the pace of mortgage defaults, the number of delinquent borrowers who are unable to update their accounts and the shift in the mix of traditional sales and foreclosures.

According to Amherst analysts, there is a vast shadow inventory of foreclosure properties that are not being seized or released to the market by lenders because of various reasons such as mortgage modification efforts, changes in state laws, hesitation by lenders to maintain foreclosed properties and control of non-performing assets in financial statements.

Amherst also explained the increases in the Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller house price index for 20 of the largest cities in the country in May and June as a result of changes in the percentage of foreclosure sales and conventional sales and not as a result of the improving situation of the housing market.

The Amherst analysts also said that the seemingly favorable seasonal indicators would soon disappear in the coming months and the soaring number of bank owned foreclosures will set in.

Amherst is an Austin, Texas-based market maker and dealer of agency securities, mortgage-backed securities and fixed-income investments. It is also an underwriter for Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae and Federal Home Loan Bank System. Laurie Goodman, meanwhile, is the former chief of fixed-income studies at UBS Securities whose team was cited by Institutional Investor in 2008.

In addition, the forecast made by the Amherst analysts is another affirmation of the earlier forecast made by Barclays Capital analysts. Barclays predicted during the first months of this year that the housing market recovery will be dampened by suppressed supply, either from homeowners who were able to put off selling their properties during the slump or from banks that decided to put off foreclosure actions or REO sales.

Glenn Boyd and his fellow Barclays analysts said this month that home prices will drop further by 8 percent, a significant decreased from their previous depreciation prediction of 13 percent.

Both groups of Amherst and Barclay analysts said that the pent-up supply of bank owned foreclosures will impede the recovery of housing markets across the country, except in places where all other economic factors are going well.

Bank Owned Foreclosures Predicted to Reach 7 Million is a post from: News of Foreclosures - Read more about how does foreclosure work.

According to data from Reuters, among mortgage borrowers nationwide, 7.58 percent were at least one month in default on their loans in August, an increase from 7.32 percent in July.

The August increase in defaults also marked the fourth straight month that defaults increased, based on the Equifax data. In August 2008, only 4.89 percent of mortgage borrowers were delinquent by at least 30 days and in August 2007, only 3.44 percent were in default by at least one month.

Meanwhile, the default rate of subprime borrowers has reached 41 percent, an increase from around 39 percent in the previous 5 months.

Providing another sign that Americans are still financially struggling, bankruptcy filings in August increased by 32 percent from filings in August last year. In July, bankruptcy filings rose by 35 percent compared to filings in July 2008.

Additionally, mortgage borrowers who are unable to restore their home loan accounts to current status are forced to see their properties go into the home foreclosure process.

Surprisingly, while more and more American homeowners are defaulting on their home loans, the percentage of Americans late by at least 2 months on their credit card debts dropped for the third consecutive month in August. Delinquencies by holders of subprime credit cards also declined.

However, the decline in credit card delinquency rates may not have been driven by consumer behavior but by card issuers who have cut their pace of card issuance significantly by 19 percent over the past 12 months. Card issuers have cut 82 million credit cards and have reduced credit card limits by $721 billion.

In addition, they have also slowed their new card issuance pace. In June, they issued only 2.6 million new credit cards, compared to 4.7 million new cards issued in June last year.

Card issuers are also gravitating towards consumers with strong credit scores, according to Equifax. In 2007, about 1 in 5 new credit cards were issued to consumers with a credit score higher than 760. Now, 2 in 5 new cards are given to those with high scores.

Total consumer debt has also declined by over $300 billion from total debt in September 2008, reflecting efforts by consumers to manage wisely their finances and avoid the home foreclosure process.

Home Foreclosure Process Driven by Unemployment is a post from: News of Foreclosures - Read more about how does foreclosure work.

Homeowners are discovering that lenders are incorporating back taxes, late penalties and other fees into the loan principal, making it impossible for many of them to sustain payments.

Currently, there are 360,165 loan modifications undergoing a trial period of three months under the Obama foreclosure program. Most of these modifications have been the result of rate reduction instead of principal reduction, which has been effective in preventing redefaults.

According to data from financial research firm CreditSights, out of all loans modified from January 2008 to March 2009, 27 percent had their monthly payments increased and 27.5 percent had their monthly payments unchanged.

The firm also reported that many borrowers who had their home loans modified fall into default again because of job loss and additional debt burdens. About 25 to 40 percent of borrowers have fallen into default again after having their loans modified, adding more units to lists of repossessed houses.

CreditSights also found that out of around 660,000 home loans modified this year, about 90 percent had their principal balance increased after modification.

One case is an adjustable-rate mortgage loan of $550,000 taken by a couple in Scottsdale, Arizona. When their first five years of low monthly payments passed, their monthly payment readjusted and increased by about $1,000 to $2,600. They were able to modify their loan, but instead of getting an affordable monthly payment plan, their monthly loan payment increased to $3,500.

According to Wells Fargo, over 80 percent of its loan modifications since June resulted in reduced monthly loan payments and most of them involved rate reduction. The bank reported it has done over 240,000 loan modifications, with over 30,000 worked out under the Obama foreclosure prevention program.

CitiMortgage meanwhile reported that about 92 percent of its loan modifications involved rate reduction, loan term extension or a combination of the two. It also said that it reduced monthly payments by reducing the principal in about 8 percent of its modifications.

Nonetheless, despite loan modification efforts, many still redefault because of job loss or income reduction. Advocates are now urging the federal government to provide short-term loans to help jobless homeowners save their homes from becoming repossessed houses.

Repossessed Houses Rising due to Higher Loan Payments is a post from: News of Foreclosures - Read more about how does foreclosure work.

As the number of foreclosure cases dropped by 0.5 percent compared to July, the number of houses repossessed by banks also dropped by 12.7 percent. More than 540,000 homes have been taken bank by lenders from January 1 to August 31.

According to housing analysts, the efforts of the federal government to pressure lenders and servicers to slow down their foreclosures and work out loans could be now making a significant dent on foreclosure filings. Another reason could be the decision of banks to delay their foreclosures or repossession of properties as they wait for better options.

Some lenders who have a lot of unsold vacant foreclosures may have decided not to pursue immediately repossessions and evictions to save themselves from maintaining the properties. They may have assumed that the delinquent borrowers would care for the properties.

Additionally, there had been many cases where delinquent homeowners were able to restore their loans to current status without help from loan modifications, reducing the number of units going to lists of bank repo homes.

According to data released recently by the Boston Federal Reserve, 30 percent of homeowners who failed to make two monthly payments were able to pay their arrears and make their accounts current.

The rise in short sales could be another reason for the drop in foreclosure actions, according to HBN Interactive president Duane LeGate. Lenders prefer short sales if they see that the home price is reasonable.

The one thing that is clouding the horizon is the scheduled resetting of option adjustable rate mortgages starting this fall. Based on a recent Fitch Ratings report, $29 billion of the $200 billion worth of option ARMS taken out during the housing boom will reset to much higher monthly payments by the end of 2009 and $67 billion will adjust next year.

The average monthly payment increase would be 63 percent, which is equivalent to $1,053, an amount too high and unaffordable for many borrowers.

Based on data from First American LoanPerformance, more than 60 percent of all borrowers who took out option ARM loans and more than 80 percent of all borrowers who took out option ARMs from 2006 to 2007 only pay the minimum amount. These very low monthly payments have actually pushed up the principal balances, making monthly payments unaffordable when they reset and pushing more mortgages into bank repo homes listings.

Bank Repo Homes Growth Slows, Default Rates Remain High is a post from: News of Foreclosures - Read more about how does foreclosure work.

The researchers contend that the percentage of sales of bank owned foreclosed properties or REOs is correlated with the rate of house price declines.

Nima Nattagh, one of the key LPS researchers, said that REO sales has risen significantly in almost all areas of the country, but there are some states where REO sales reached a stunning 60 percent of all home sales. She explained that housing markets are much more battered when foreclosures are unprecedented and REO sales comprised a big majority of total home sales.

The LPS researchers focused on two different states – Massachusetts and Michigan – to illustrate their contention.

Michigan was chosen as a representative of the battered housing market because the state, along with Nevada, had the highest percentage of REO sales in the first 6 months of the year. Over 60 percent of total home sales in Michigan were REO sales in the first 6 half of 2009.

The other battered housing markets, Arizona and California, also had large percentages of distressed sales and REO sales, but they had lower REO percentages than that of Michigan. Over 50 percent of total home sales in California and Arizona in the first 6 months were REO sales.

LPS reported that REO foreclosure home sales comprised 64 percent of total home sales in Michigan in the first 6 months. This rate pushed down the prices of non-REO homes by over 26 percent since their highest price levels in 2005. But if REO sales are included in the computation, the drop in home prices was nearly 47 percent.

On the other hand, Massachusetts, which is one of the states which have avoided record foreclosure sales, REO sales did not push down home prices as sharply as in Michigan.

In the first 6 months of this year, only 14 percent of total home sales in Massachusetts were REO sales. This lower percentage pushed down the prices of non-REO homes by only 15 percent. If REO home sales were included in the computation, the home price decline was 19 percent, which is still close to 15 percent.

Another important finding in the LPS report is the increase in the percentage of REO foreclosure home sales despite the decrease in total home sales in the first 6 months of the year in several states.

Foreclosure Home Sales Affect Home Prices Differently is a post from: News of Foreclosures - Read more about how does foreclosure work.