Don’t Be Fooled by Florida Foreclosure Drop
The soaring Florida home mortgage foreclosure rate edged down a bit in July from June - but it was still 78 percent higher last month than it was a year ago.
Fallout from problems in the nation’s mortgage markets continued to rain down on borrowers, according to the report released Tuesday.
The Florida real estate market had the nation’s seventh-highest rate of foreclosures per household in July: one for every 431 households, according to the survey by RealtyTrac, a California-based foreclosure-tracking company. Nevada, Georgia, Michigan, California, Colorado and Ohio all had worse rates, in that order.
In July, the state had the nation’s seventh-highest rate of foreclosures per household in July: 1 of every 431.
Florida’s year-over-year rate of increase in Florida mortgage default filings and bank repossessions was also lower than the national average of 93 percent.
From June to July, Florida’s foreclosure rate per household actually improved a bit, by more than 8 percent, but month-to-month changes are more volatile than year-over-year comparisons and less reflective of longer-term trends.
President Bush sought to calm nervous investors Tuesday as the Federal Reserve plowed $3.75billion into the financial system, the latest efforts to stanch a spreading credit crisis that started with the mortgage meltdown and has since unhinged Wall Street.
Wrapping up a summit in Montebello, Quebec, with the prime minister of Canada and the president of Mexico, Bush took the opportunity to point out that the U.S. economy remains in good shape and should be able to weather the financial storm.
“The fundamental question, ‘Is there enough liquidity in our system?’ And the answer is ‘Yes, there is,’ ” the president said. In another erratic session on Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrials finished down 30.49 points Tuesday.
Subprime mortgages are ratcheting up their adjustable interest rates and will continue to do so for months to come, warned Dan Dowling, president of United Mortgage Capital Corp., a mortgage brokerage in Altamonte Springs.
That, in turn, will force more homeowners and small-time investors into foreclosure as they find their monthly loan payments rising out of reach, he said.
“I don’t think the worst is here yet,” said Dowling, who has worked in the Central Florida mortgage industry for 12 years. “For many of them, there’s just no escape, no remedy,” he said, other than to let the home revert to the lender through foreclosure.
Home values are flat or falling, he said, and that has prevented homeowners from building equity, or an ownership stake, in their properties. This prevents investors from stepping in to buy such properties from the homeowners before the foreclosure process concludes.
Metro Orlando had the nation’s 60th-worst rate of foreclosures per household in July - one for every 593 households, the RealtyTrac report showed.
SOURCE: The Orlando Sentinel
