Tampa Bay foreclosures rise much less than nationally

Another 7,216 home foreclosure cases hit the courts in the Tampa Bay area in June, but the mortgage crisis appears to be easing a bit locally.

Compared to June 2008, the number of foreclosure filings rose 12 percent last month in the region.
That’s a tentative cause for celebration: Year-to-year rises in foreclosures had been running between 33 percent to 48 percent from January to May.

The nation as a whole didn’t benefit from the same mitigating trend. In the United States, the 335,176 foreclosure filings in June represented a rise of 33 percent from June 2008. Florida’s year-to-year foreclosure increase was 31 percent.

RealtyTrac, a California real estate company, provided the numbers: Download RealtygtracJune09

Relatively brisk home sales locally have helped clear financially distressed homes from the market. According to the Greater Tampa Association of Realtors, home sales in June were the highest of any month since December 2006.

By my reading, Florida might help lead the nation out of the housing crisis, hewing to the first-in-first-out theory. We can only hope.

Comments

[Frank Lee]

The FULL story is certainly not being presented by the "numbers" touted from (un)RealtyTrac.

1) What comprises that 7,216 figure? According to your spreadsheet, Lis Pendens, REOs and NFS. These are not necessarily "cases" but filings and other sales.

2) The figure does NOT include, nor account for a very important statistic - Lis Pendens RELEASES. RealtyTrac doesn't list those for obvious reasons.

3) The figure casts a wide-scope MSA that is not representative of more local markets. For those, you have to look at the chart, but you're better off going directly to the OFFICIAL source - the county records.

For example, Hillsborough County had a slight *reduction* in effective year-to-year AND month-to-month LP filings (according to their own Recorder's web site). Factor in a greater percentage of RELEASES and the reduction tally becomes quite dramatic...17.3% less year-to-year and 12.3 less month-to-month.

- Certainly not healthy, but headed in a much better direction.

[Fuzzy Bear]

"By my reading, Florida might help lead the nation out of the housing crisis, hewing to the first-in-first-out theory. We can only hope."

I do not think Florida will be the state to lead the nation out of the housing crisis. Florida is still in deep trouble in terms of inventory and "hidden inventory" of homes and unemployment and it will take years to clean up this mess!

[Tino]

No, the FULL story is that the number of homes being foreclosed on continues to skyrocket.

By Mr. Lee's logic, if the unemployment rate went from 8.0% to 9.0% one month, and then went up to 9.7% the following month, that's a "good thing", because the rate of increase is slowing.

Sure, buddy. Keep drinking the realtor kool-aid.

[Frank Lee]

I don't believe any clarification is actually needed. Regardless, if you are reading/comprehension challenged, the 17.3% and 12.3% reductions are not *rate* reductions...those are ACTUAL reductions.

In the entirety of the "Housing Health" algorithm in Hillsborough:

1) June Sales were UP
2) June Pricing was STABLE (6 months running now)
3) June Effective Foreclosure Filings are DOWN
4) June Inventory is DOWN
5) June Foreclosure Sale Mix is ??? "Estimates place them as high as half of all sales. Sale of non-distressed homes are still stumbling." -according to Thorner. Where's the corroborating report link?
6) JUNE Interest Rates went DOWN
7) JULY Interest Rates are still DOWN
8) JULY Unemployment is LESS THAN EXPECTED.

What's not to like?

[Tino]

from an article today:

"For the Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater area, the unemployment rate shot up to 11.1 percent in June from 10.7 the previous month. This figure represents a year-over-year increase of 4.7 percentage points."

Happy days are here again!

Mr. Lee, your math skills are below that of a child who can't figure out how the calculator works. You once again don't get it. Look at my example above: you are claiming that since the RATE OF CHANGE is slowing, that the underlying total is dropping.

Like my unemployment example, the overall total is still increasing.

Typical realtor-speak, using a combination of poor math and outright lies to fabricate a fairy tale.

[Tino]

In June, 7,216 new foreclosure cases hit the regional courts, adding to inventory. Someone abandoning their mortgage payment is creating new inventory, because the house is going to be eventually become a REO property.

The realtors claim that 1,714 regional properties were sold in June and taken out of inventory.

Mr. Lee is now attempting to tell us that 1,714 + lis pendens releases > 7,216.

But wait! We are being told that homes are coming out of foreclosure faster than they are going in. So how many releases were there? I counted 498 in Hillsborough in June. I can't imagine the other counties added up to 5,000 more.

What say you, Mr. Lee? We are awaiting your mathematical prowess...

[Frank Lee]

Tino,

1) 7,216 by RealtyCrack is a composite of how many counties in the Bay Area?

2) 7,216 includes LPs and what?

3) 1,714 sales from the GTAR figures only include Hillsborough and parts of southeastern Pasco counties.

4) Was unemployment greater than EXPECTED, as EXPECTED, or less than EXPECTED?

5) There were 772 releases in June '09 for Hillsborough County according to their Official records search.
http://pubrec3.hillsclerk.com/oncore/search.aspx?bd=6%2F1%2F2009&ed=6%2F30%2F2009&n=***&bt=O&d=7%2F17%2F2009&dt=RELLP&st=fullname
(you may have to place the fist drop box as "direct name" to keep from exceeding the 2,000 limit)

6) Repeating a line at the bottom of my first post..."- Certainly not healthy, but headed in a much better direction."

---
You know, it's funny... If read your posts with Vince Shlomi's voice in mind, they're much more entertaining.

ShamWow!

[fuzzy bore]

http://blogs.wsj.com/developments/2009/07/16/foreclosure-filings-reach-15-million-in-first-half-of-09/

You see James, the Wall Street Journal understands that using the word "filings" when discussing the number of, well, filings, is accurate. The Journal understands that "keeping it simple" by removing that word would result in a misleading headline.

When readers see a headline that says "Tampa Bay foreclosures rise much less than nationally" they expect you to print a number showing how many houses were actually seized by the lender. Unfortunately for us readers, you print no such number. Instead, you discuss the number of filings.

Please, you are giving journalism a bad name by continually printing misleading headlines.

[bobby]

"Mr. Lee, your math skills are below that of a child who can't figure out how the calculator works."

Why can't we say what we want to say and be civil about it?

[Fuzzy Bear]

Fuzzy Bore Says: "Please, you are giving journalism a bad name by continually printing misleading headlines."

Spoken from the expert in media and everything else who sits on the sidelines coaching a team he/she has no control over, but uses copycat methods such as the blog name "Fuzzy Bore". How creative on the part of Fuzzy Bore!