Foreclosures Tumble to Five-Year Low as U.S. Housing Recovering

[Purveyor]

By Dan Levy - May 17, 2012

Foreclosure filings in the U.S. fell to a five-year low last month as lenders sought to avoid seizing property and a housing recovery showed signs of taking hold.

The number of default, auction and seizure notices sent to homeowners in April totaled 188,780, down 14 percent from a year earlier and 5 percent from the previous month, according to RealtyTrac Inc. It was the lowest tally since July 2007, before the onset of the biggest housing crash in seven decades, the Irvine, California-based data seller said today in a report.

The “gradually rising foreclosure tide” forecast by RealtyTrac after a February settlement by the nation’s biggest mortgage servicers over faulty practices has yet to materialize, limiting the number of properties on the market and propping up prices. Banks are finding alternatives to home seizures, selling distressed property for less than the amount owed on the mortgage, known as a short sale, or modifying loans for borrowers struggling to keep up payments while an improving economy is helping to ease defaults.

“Things are getting better and the number of vulnerable households is going down,” Paul Willen, senior economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, said in a telephone interview. “The pool of borrowers is much more stable than it was two or three years ago.”

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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/print/2012-05-17/foreclosures-plunge-to-five-year-low-in-u-s-recovery-mortgages.html

[bhikkhu]

1. Excellent news!

In my own case, I decided against a fee-laden refinance; instead, I'll just soldier on barely breaking even every months with high payments. The advantage is that it all gets paid off earlier (5 more years), and of course all that's only possible because I was able to hold onto my job and things have pretty much stabilized.

I told my brother about the HARP program a few months ago - he was way upside-down in a house, with an adjustable rate mortgage that was killing him. He said it took a month, but his bank got the whole thing got redone under HARP and he's in good shape now.

I know there's still no shortage of hardship for many people, but its good to hear the balance is tipping the other way.