Florida Ranks Third In Foreclosure Race

December 18th, 2007

The sun is covered with thick foreclosure clouds in the Sunshine State considering it is one of the top rankers in this dubious race. Florida registered the third highest number of lender repossessions (the lenders mostly being the banks). The state is the fourth as regards year-to-date foreclosures with the number rising to 36,393. It is an increase of 156% from the figure it showed during the same period in the previous year – 14,203. Florida is also leading the country in pre-foreclosure filings in November going up to 33,194. This is calculated to be 194% jump from what it was during November 2006 – 11,278.

In the field of year-to-date pre-foreclosure filings per capita the Sunshine State ranked as high as second. There were 34 listings per 1000 units – an increase of 141% from what it was during the same period in 2006. The state as a whole registered 214,694 pre-foreclosure listings – a rise of 140% from 89,335 that had been filed during the first eleven months of the previous year.

Across the country about 1.1 million houses entered into foreclosure this year – a rise of 93% from 559,750 listings in the previous year during the same time. Roughly banks repossessed 526,936 properties during the first 11 months of this year. This calculates to six out of every 1,000 houses in US. It is jump by 41% from 2006.

The online groups tracking data have been at their job meticulously. This is all the more important because the government does not have any machinery geared to do the comprehensive job. It requires to be noted that the figures may at times be confusing with one house being counted more than once. This is because the foreclosure is counted as one step but in reality this judicial process involves many stages. One house may have multiple mortgages against it.

The question arises why should the golden sunny state of Florida be harangued by foreclosures. It is a paradise on earth. The very fact that it was a paradise caused housing prices to be at a premium and this in turn attracted many speculators and investors. The easy money being practically thrown around by the sub-mortgage loans were availed of to invest in large-scale speculation. All were confident that real estate prices could never come down. But the irony of fate is that this is exactly what is happening.