We are discussing the alarming increase in the number of foreclosures in Maryland. Data from RealtyTrac and other real estate market research companies show that, as we said in our last post, the other shoe has finally dropped: Any respite the market had while the states and banks and mortgage servicing companies hammered out their agreements (then hammered out their amended agreements) is over. Lenders are picking up files that have been sitting in in-boxes for months.
Maryland is one of a handful of states that involves the courts in foreclosure proceedings, and that extends the timeline. Add to that the foreclosure laws passed by the General Assembly at the beginning of the crisis, and the timeline grows even longer. At last count, it was taking upwards of 575 days — more than 18 months — to complete a foreclosure here.
In other parts of the country, the inventory of distressed homes is dwindling, and home values are on the rise. Not so in Maryland. With so many homes in or on the verge of being in the so-called shadow inventory, the state’s real estate market could be heading for a prolonged slump.
Even if home prices are not what they could be, though, market analysts say that demand is up, and the inventory should move more quickly than it has in the past. New buyers are entering the market, attracted by lower prices and rock-bottom interest rates.
Prince George’s County is a good example of today’s market. Year-over-year, the county logged a 26-percent increase in the number of foreclosure filings by the end of June. But Prince George’s is no longer the state’s hardest-hit area, as it was during the peak of the crisis. Baltimore is actually worse off. State data shows that no area in Prince George’s qualifies as a “severe foreclosure hot spot,” quite a change from years past.
Still, the data and the shadow inventory and the outlook and state hot spot lists may not mean much to the homeowners whose homes are now in foreclosure. The process may take more than a year, but that is a year of waiting to find work, waiting to hear from the lender, waiting for relief … waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Source:
Washington Post, “Thousands of Marylanders are losing homes in second wave of foreclosures,” Annys Shin, Aug. 11, 2013