Completed foreclosure or REOS-
drove foreclosure activity in May to a 19 month high. The total was up 1 percent from April and 16 percent from April 2014.
RealtyTrac said it was the third month in a row that REOs increased on an annual basis and scheduled auctions have increased year-over-year for four of the last eight months. May REOs were 56 percent below the peak of 102,134 REOs in September 2013 but still nearly twice the average monthly number of 23,119 in 2005 and 2006 before the housing bubble burst in August 2006.
“May foreclosure numbers are a classic good news-bad news scenario, with the number of homeowners starting the foreclosure process stabilizing at pre-housing crisis levels but the number of homeowners actually losing their homes to foreclosure still well above pre-crisis levels and on the rise,” said Daren Blomquist, vice president at RealtyTrac. “Lenders and courts are pushing through stubborn foreclosure cases that have been languishing in foreclosure limbo for years as options to prevent foreclosure are exhausted or left untapped.”
Of metro areas with a population of over 200,000, those with the highest foreclosure rates were Atlantic City, New Jersey (a filing on one in every 230 housing units), Lakeland, Florida (one in every 331 housing units), Ocala, Florida (one in every 335 housing units), Miami, Florida (one in every 347 housing units) and Jacksonville, Florida (one in every 348 housing units).
