Foreclosures keep going from bad to worse: [Thanks L!]
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Despite concerted government-led and lender-supported efforts to prevent foreclosures, the number of filings hit a record high in the third quarter, according to a report issued Thursday.
"They were the worst three months of all time," said Rick Sharga, spokesman for RealtyTrac, an online marketer of foreclosed homes.
During that time, 937,840 homes received a foreclosure letter — whether a default notice, auction notice or bank repossession, the RealtyTrac report said. That means one in every 136 U.S. homes were in foreclosure, which is a 5% increase from the second quarter and a 23% jump over the third quarter of 2008.
And things aren’t getting any better. M sent me this worrying bit of information a couple of days ago:
As expected, another $659,000,000 of mortgage debt defaulted in the last week……..just in Phoenix [metro]……..Maricopa county only!!!!! This is a continuation of a trend we’ve been tracking all year.
Sure, Phoenix has one of the highest foreclosure rates in the nation. Even still, that $659M number helps give a sense of scale to the problem.
Sheila Bair, head of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., told a Senate hearing this week:
Evidence is building that financial markets are stabilizing and the American economy is starting to grow again.
According to the Christian Science Monitor:
[M]ost US banks appear likely to muddle through their problems. Apart from the government help – from low-cost loans to infusions of capital – earnings on good loans, coupled with loss-reserves, will help banks work through their losses. And the largest banks are diversified into areas far afield from real estate.
I think they are going to have an awful lot to muddle through.
Turning Japanese the Vapors
In between the ads for car stereos, tattoos, and breast augmentation, I found a good article on the Phoenix bubble fallout in the print edition of the weekly alternative newspaper, the Phoenix New Times. Of course, it is online as well.
“On the first floor, residents and the public would be treated to a gourmet grocery store with coffee drinks and gelato, a bakery, and other shops. A new Italian restaurant was to be built in partnership with one of the Valley’s top chefs, Michael de Maria. The Trattoria M was to be equipped with a “wine aficionado room” and private “chef’s table” room, plus a casual dining area. (De Maria, who closed his Michael’s at the Citadel restaurant in Scottsdale two years ago to focus on Centerpoint, did not return calls for this article).”
The place described above is an unfinished, deteriorating structure frequented by transients and those on alcohol-based adventures. Probably not wine aficionados.
And hundreds line up to invest money into a fund named Radical Bunny? Sounds like a stable, winning organization to me:
“Why did he put his money into Radical Bunny? Easy, he says; it promised a solid 11 percent interest, while most everyone else offered 6 or 7 percent. The chance to make money with money appealed to many people with lesser means, Hansen says. “Hundreds” of people took out second mortgages on their homes and plunked money into Radical Bunny. Many will likely lose those homes, he predicts.”
“Bankruptcy records reveal that hundreds of Radical Bunny debtors are owed hundreds of thousands of dollars each, and much of that is tied up in the failed Centerpoint project. Several, like Hansen, had invested well over a million dollars.”
http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/2009-10-15/news/concrete-bungle-tempe-s-twin-towers-condo-project-collapses-financially-leaving-investors-in-the-rubble/