Foreclosures in the US equal to 1 in 350

For the sixth month in a row, foreclosures in the United States topped the 300,000 mark. Last month a total of 358,471 homes were put into foreclosure by either getting a default notice or by being put on the auction block. The figure is up 18% from August 2008, but it is actually down half a percent from July 2009.

This number totals to 1 in about 350 homes getting a foreclosure notice of some kind.

Morris A. Davis, an assistant real-estate professor at the Wisconsin School of Business had this to say about the foreclosure rate, “The foreclosure numbers are largely unemployment related. As long as 15 million Americans are unemployed, record foreclosures will continue.”

Out of all 50 states, Nevada has been hit the worst. With one in every 62 households in the state getting a foreclosure notice of some kind, Nevada had 17,902 foreclosure notices issued in August. That figure is up 8% from July; contrast that against the half a percent decrease for the country overall and you’ll see that Nevada is hurting.

Following Nevada for the worst foreclosure rates in August was Florida.  In Florida, one in every 140 homes received a notice. In California it was one in every 144.

In the second quarter 2009, one in 25 homes were in foreclosure according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. That is just over 4% of the homes in the United States.

It is easy to tell when a city or state has been particularly hit hard by the recession, falling home prices, unemployment, and foreclosures; all of which are  tied together right now. If you look at the average home price in California and how far the prices have fallen since the beginning of the recession, it is easy to see why most of the homes would end up in foreclosure.

Another problem is the fact that when you take falling home prices and put it together with increasing unemployment. That is a recipe for foreclosure.

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