Salem foreclosure activity drops in September

By Ryan Mooney, Town Correspondent

Foreclosure activity dropped in Salem last month, reflecting a statewide trend of year-over-year improvement during the first month that foreclosure petitions dropped below 1,000 this year, according to data released by the Warren Group.

Only one home was foreclosed on last month in Salem, compared with two in September of 2011. So far this year, there have been 36 foreclosures completed in the city, the same as the first nine months of last year.

Foreclosure petitions, which mark the start of the foreclosure process also dropped, from nine in September of last year, to five last month, but are up by nearly 45 percent for the year.

Completed foreclosures in the Bay State declined for the fourth month in a row, according to Timothy Warren Jr., CEO of the Warren Group. He points to the drop in foreclosure petitions as a good sign of things to come.

"The pace of homes entering the foreclosure process slowed in September, another strong indicator of a housing market recovery," Warren said in a statement.

Foreclosure auctions in Salem have also dropped for the year, from 132 through September last year to 99 this year, and showed a decline of more than half from 17 in September of 2011 to six last month.

Similarly, there were 126 foreclosure auctions across Essex County, a more than 41 percent year-over-year drop from September of 2011, and the county has seen a year-to-date drop of more than 17 percent, from 2,022 in the first nine months of last year, to 1,674 so far this year.

For town-by-town foreclosure data, click here. County-by-county numbers can be found here.

Ryan Mooney can be reached at globe.mooney@yahoo.com. Follow him on Twitter @mooney_ryan.