As mortgage servicers have been getting their foreclosure affidavits and other documentation in order, a growing number of delinquent mortgages are moving through the foreclosure process. More than half of last month’s increase was on Florida properties, though California played a big role.
In October, 230,678 U.S. properties were hit with a foreclosure filing. That was more than the 214,855 filings made during September.
The statistics were released Thursday by RealtyTrac, which relies on a database accumulated from more than 2,200 U.S. counties.
RealtyTrac Chief Executive Officer James Saccacio explained in the report that foreclosures rose as lenders cleaned up documentation problems that have been plaguing them for the past year.
“However, recent state court rulings and new state laws keep changing the rules of the foreclosure game on the fly, creating more uncertainty in the housing market and threatening to prolong the road to a robust real estate recovery,” Saccacio added.
Foreclosures, however, fell from 332,172 filings previously reported for October 2010.
Roughly 2,056,797 foreclosure filings have been made so far this year. Filings include default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions.
California accounted for 55,312 of last month’s filings, more than any other state and more than the 51,842 foreclosures in the Golden State during September.
After that was Florida, where filings climbed to 33,073 from 24,077.
Next was Michigan’s 16,106, Illinois’12,522 and Arizona’s 10,626.
With only 11 foreclosures last month, Washington, D.C., stole the fewest-foreclosures ranking from Vermont.
On out of every 563 U.S. homes were hit with a filing in the latest period. The rate deteriorated from one-in-605 a month earlier but was much better than one-in-389 a year earlier.
Nevada continued to struggle with the worst foreclosure rate: one filing for each 180 housing units. But the Silver State showed improvement from one-in-118 during September.
Las Vegas relinquished its No. 1 title among large metropolitan areas with a one-in-162 rate.
California followed Nevada with a one-in-243 rate. Stockton took the No. 1 metropolitan ranking with a one-in 143 rate.
Arizona’s one-in-259 was the next worst state, then Florida’s one-in-268 and Michigan’s one-in-282.
With only one foreclosure filed for each 25,921 housing units, Washington, D.C., had the most favorable rate.
Moving on to real-estate-owned filings, 67,624 U.S. properties were repossessed in October, a little more than the 65,047 foreclosures that were completed the previous month. But REO filings sat well below the 93,236 filed in October 2010.
In the first 10 months of this year, U.S. REO filings amounted to 952,705.
Servicers took back 9,770 California properties, fewer than the 10,811 completed foreclosures the state had a month prior but more than any other state.
Florida repossessions numbered 7,184, jumping from September’s 5,407.
No. 3 Michigan had 5,583 REOÂ filings, then 4,302 in Texas and 4,194 in Arizona.
