A second foreclosure storm brewing?
Home sales were up again yesterday nationally, rising 3.6 percent over June.
It was the third straight, month-over-month increase, and the latest sign that life of some sort may be finally returning to a sector that was all but dead few months ago. (Of course, prices just keep on falling, with the median sale price nationally of $181,500.)
But just as the real estate market appears to have pulled out of its nose dive, more trouble appears to be brewing on the foreclosure front.
That’s the first step in a month’s long process that can eventually lead to a foreclosure sale or auction.
What’s happening here is that the baton is being passed. Many of those homeowners we’ve been reading about for years with those crazy subprime loans have been swept to the street.
Taking their place in the foreclosure line are homeowners who have lost their jobs and are now falling behind on their payments.
No Massachusetts oddity, the same pattern can be seen in newly released foreclosure stats in California.
Will another wave of foreclosures swamp signs of a budding recovery in the housing market?
Your guess is as good as mine but it sure doesn’t look good.
