According to analysts, majority of these notices are due to job losses, unlike previous years when foreclosure troubles are more often associated with fraudulent mortgage lending practices. They further added that more than half of Atlanta foreclosed homes owners were unable to pay their mortgages because of lay offs or salary cuts.

The city would have been an ideal place for people who purchase repossessed houses for sale, but even with the low prices and record mortgage rates, homebuyers are opting not to make any purchase, foreclosure or otherwise. This symbolizes the unsteady condition of the housing market, not only in Atlanta, but in the rest of the country as evident in the latest national housing statistics.

According to the Mortgage Bankers Association, one household out of 10 in the U.S. is in danger of losing their home to bank owned foreclosures before the year ends. This prediction is expected to come to fruition unless more jobs are created and unemployment rates are lowered to reasonable levels.

As evidence of how bad unemployment has influenced the number of bank and Fannie Mae foreclosures all around the country, housing market figures showed that 9.9% of borrowers all over the U.S. are at least 30 days delayed in their mortgage payment as of June 30, 2010. The latest estimate hardly differs from the over 10% figure recorded as of April 30, 2010.

Meanwhile, the considerable rise in the number of foreclosure notices in Atlanta, as reported by Equity Depot, signifies how bad the economy is in the metro Georgia region. Although only about 25% of the Atlanta properties under foreclosure listings during August have made it to the steps of courthouses for an auction sale, the increase is still worrisome for most local real estate analysts.

According to them, almost all economic indicators are conspiring to feed government and bank owned foreclosures problems in the city. With the prices of homes continuing to drop and unemployment rates showing no sign of declining, analysts stated that the metro area is in for a rough 2010.

Bank Owned Foreclosures Surged in Atlanta As Unemployment Rate Rises is a post from: News of Foreclosures – Read more about how does foreclosure work.

Foreclosure News

Home mortgage rates and real estate news – CNNMoney.com

With the number of New York foreclosed homes continuing to rise, prices of properties also continue to decline, but with less buyers willing to take advantage of the low prices and make any property purchase. Because of this, even luxury dwellings are using unconventional strategies that can help them sell their units.

The FHA is known to help buyers of repossessed properties for sale and other foreclosed dwellings. Recently, the agency has agreed to insure the mortgages for the condominium units at the Gramercy Park project called Tempo. The agreement will allow buyers to provide a down payment of 3.5% for the apartments in a neighborhood where apartments and condominiums usually sell for at least 0,000 a unit.

With the recession hitting the income of most buyers, some of them usually opt for the cheaper manufactured foreclosed homes instead of purchasing single family dwellings or apartments. With the FHA collaboration, developers of Tempo are hoping that more people will be able to afford a unit from their project.

According to the people behind the condo development project, the FHA approval will help them sell the apartments in a market where homebuyers are mostly reluctant to make a purchase, even for cheaper foreclosed property at auctions. With sales stalling in the pricier residential property market, a help from the federal agency is expected to go a long way.

Several other condominium development projects in Manhattan have reportedly sought FHA backing following the agency’s decision to loosen its financing rules. Changes in FHA rules have resulted in the agency having the ability to insure mortgage loans even in projects with only 30% of the units in contract.

The latest development is expected to give homebuyers a home purchase choice beyond manufactured foreclosed homes. It is also projected to fill in the gap left by Fannie Mae when the mortgage firm decided to tighten its lending rules for condominiums in 2009.

Manufactured Foreclosed Homes Not the Only Properties Seeking FHA Aid is a post from: News of Foreclosures – Read more about how does foreclosure work.

Foreclosure News

Campinas is home to one of the hottest regional real estate markets in the country, and with scores of foreign companies invested in branches there, it's attracting more people and attention every day. Whether you're considering investing in commercial property, or a high-end residential neighborhood such as Cambuí, there's no end to investment potential in Campinas.

Newly available for purchase in the Cambui district of beautiful Campinas, Brazil is this fantastic 3 bedroom, 4 and 1/2 bath condominium. Featuring two distinct guest suites with walk-in closets and a luxurious master suite with brand new hardwood floors throughout, this beautiful apartment for sale in Campinas, Brazil is ready for you to move right in.

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• Large American-style kitchen with polished marble countertops and sinks
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This one-of-a-kind home is spacious and bright, with an elegant living and dining area built for entertaining. Enjoy the beautiful insight from the window and all the pleasures of the chic and in-demand Cambui district while still maintaining the peace and quiet of a private home.

Real Estate Boom in Brazil: Campinas is a Great Option for Foreign Investors is a post from: News of Foreclosures – Read more about how does foreclosure work.

Foreclosure News

By MARC BEJA

NEW YORK — Colleges and universities are buying up chunks of land at bargain prices, sometimes without a clear idea how they’ll be used.

Some are taking advantage of good sales during a sluggish economy, while others, like Columbia University, are continuing a practice they’ve done for decades, buying even if the price isn’t discounted.

The University of Dayton last year acquired the 115-acre world headquarters of technology company NCR Corp. for the fire sale price of $18 million after buying 50 acres from the company for three times the per-acre price in 2005. And the University of Delaware last year bought a 272-acre former Chrysler auto plant in Newark, Del. for $24 million.

The schools are banking on future growth to make their purchases good investments. In the interim, many are leasing the properties they’re not using until they need them.

It’s good that colleges are looking years or even decades ahead, but investing in real estate can be risky, academic research analyst Jane Wellman said.

“People who just lost their shirts in the last real estate crash know the risk of real estate as an investment portfolio,” Wellman said. Colleges “are banking that now is the low point in real estate, and it may not be.”

For years, Columbia bought land wherever it could, amassing more than 17 acres on Manhattan’s Upper West Side between 2002 and 2009. Construction has begun on a multibillion-dollar expansion that would build new housing, laboratories, open space and tree-lined sidewalks.

University President Lee Bollinger said it won’t be finished for at least 30 years. And while some of the space has been dedicated to specific departments, Bollinger said he’s intentionally not deciding how the rest of the buildings will be used.

“You want to give future generations the ability to create their own university,” he said.

Dan Fasulo, a managing director for real estate research firm Real Capital Analytics, says many colleges are jumping at new opportunities to buy land cheaply since the economic slump.

Previously, “universities were very much shut out of the market at its top,” Fasulo said. “You really couldn’t compete with private investors who were scooping up properties in their neighborhoods.”

Some schools say the economic downturn drove prices so low that it was cheaper to buy land with existing buildings now than it would be to construct new ones later.

University of Dayton President Daniel Curran thought he got “the deal of a lifetime” five years ago, when the Ohio university bought 50 acres from NCR Corp. for $25 million. Then he got a better offer: the company’s expansive world headquarters property — complete with a moat and a mini golf course — for $18 million.

The university started moving in this summer. The property includes a 415,000-square-foot building that will house a science facility, an alumni center and a huge parking garage. Curran said the university saved itself the expense of building new space, and is leasing unused parts of the building for extra cash.

The university still has 90 acres available for expansion.

“We don’t know what the library of the future is going to be, but we need a space for that library,” Curran said.

The former Chrysler Group LLC plant the University of Delaware bought won’t be completely built out for 50 years, said Executive Vice President Scott Douglass. Since nearly a quarter of it has no specific plans, it may be used for scientific testing, Douglass said.

At Columbia, where tuition and living expenses are soaring in New York, junior Jose Robledo said although he’d like his university to put more money toward financial aid, it’s more important for it to expand and try to improve — even if he’s not around to see it.

“If the university continues being a leader in research, that makes sure my degree is still valuable 20, 30 years down the road.”

At York College in York, Pa., most of a 28-acre plot bought last year for $5.8 million is being set aside. George Waldner, president of the 4,750-undergraduate campus, said it was better to buy now than wait, when “you’re going to pay a premium because everyone is going to know you need a piece of land close to your campus.”

Fasulo offered colleges some words of caution, though, saying land investment in a rural area is riskier than near a place like Columbia, in one of the nation’s most desirable real estate markets.

“From a market perspective, there would be a lot less risk worrying about surplus property in a place like Manhattan than if you were out in the woods somewhere,” he said. “Let’s say enrollment falls in half, you can sell it off as a condominium.”

And Wellman, executive director of the Delta Project on Postsecondary Education Costs, Productivity and Accountability, a nonprofit studying college costs, noted that even when a building isn’t being used for academics, a university still has to pay to maintain it.

“You’re going to have to keep raising money and getting more money every year just to keep the hamster running in the cage,” she said. “They’re perpetuating a very expensive cost structure, and I don’t think every school can maintain that.”

But at Stevenson University in Owings Mills, Md., President Kevin Manning said necessity trumps other concerns.

When Manning became president in 2000, there were no residence halls, and students lived in hotels six miles from campus. In 2003, the school bought 17 acres and built its first dorms. It got an additional 60 acres during the last five years to build a student center, business school and sports complexes.

Enrollment increased 26 percent between 2003 and 2009, from 2,710 students to 3,432. Stevenson is now eyeing an additional 150 acres and is considering spending $25 million to build a dorm and a stadium for a new football team.

“I don’t think there’s anybody in our category that can say they don’t have anxiety from what we’re doing,” Manning said. “But the confidence far outweighs the anxiety, so we go ahead and do it.”

Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

News Facts

*The Conventional Mortgage Home Price Index (CMHPI) Purchase-Only Series for the United States registered a 3.1 percent (13.2 percent annualized) increase in the second quarter relative to the first quarter on a not-seasonally-adjusted basis. U.S. home values fell 0.2 percent relative to the second quarter a year ago.

*Home values rose in all nine Census Divisions. This is the first time since the second quarter of 2009 that all Census Divisions have witnessed positive changes in home values.

Related Links

* Economic & Housing Research
* CMHPI Data
* Weekly Primary Mortgage Market Survey

* The revised change in home values for the first quarter of 2010 is a decrease of 2.3 percent (-8.9 percent annualized) relative to the fourth quarter of 2009 and a decrease of 1.3 percent relative to the first quarter of 2009.
*The CMHPI Classic Series, which includes data on both home purchase values and appraisals, indicated that average U.S. home values fell 0.5 percent (-1.8 percent annualized) during the second quarter. Comparing the second quarter of 2010 with the second quarter of 2009, the Classic Series shows 4.6 percent depreciation.

Quotes

Attributed to Amy Crews Cutts, Freddie Mac deputy chief economist

*”We saw increases in home values in the second quarter that were very strong across all regions – there is no doubt that some of this was due in part to the now-expired homebuyer tax credits which boosted sales activity as well as to the usual seasonal bump we see each Spring.

*”Although the homebuyer tax credit programs have expired, 30-year fixed mortgage rates have decreased by more than half a percentage point since the end of April, setting multiple new record lows according to Freddie Mac’s Primary Mortgage Market Survey®. We will be watching carefully the home sales reports in August and September to see whether the July drop was the start of a new trend down or the result of a temporary pull-forward due to the tax-credit programs.”

Regional Summary

The CMHPI Purchase-Only Series had the following regional house-price changes:

*East North Central Division (IL, IN, MI, OH, WI): rose 4.9 percent (21.2 percent, annualized) in the second quarter of 2010. Over the last 12 months, home values decreased 1.7 percent, and during the last five years, home values decreased 7.4 percent.*West North Central Division (IA, KS, MN, MO, ND, NE, SD): increased 4.2 percent (17.9 percent, annualized) in the second quarter of 2010. Over the last 12 months, home values were unchanged; over the last five years, home values increased 0.7 percent.

*Mountain Division (AZ, CO, ID, MT, NM, NV, UT, WY): increased 3.7 percent (15.9 percent, annualized) in the second quarter of 2010. In the last 12 months, home values decreased 3.8 percent; during the last five years, home values declined 5.2 percent.

*South Atlantic Division (DC, DE, FL, GA, MD, NC, SC, VA, WV): grew 3.6 percent (15.1 percent, annualized) in the second quarter of 2010. Over the last 12 months, home values decreased 2.6 percent, and during the last five years, home values fell 5.8 percent.

*Pacific Division (AK, CA, HI, OR, WA): climbed up 3.1 percent (13.1 percent, annualized) in the second quarter of 2010. Over the last 12 months, home values increased 4.2 percent, and during the last five years, home values have decreased 14.7 percent.

*East South Central Division (AL, KY, MS, TN): grew 2.8 percent (11.8 percent, annualized) in the second quarter of 2010. Over the last 12 months, home values decreased 1.0 percent, and during the last five years, home values increased 8.8 percent.

*West South Central Division (AR, LA, OK, TX): rose 2.7 percent (11.4 percent, annualized) in the second quarter of 2010. Over the last 12 months, home values increased 1.2, and during the last five years, home values increased 16.6 percent.

*New England Division (CT, MA, ME, NH, RI, VT): increased 1.3 percent (5.3 percent, annualized) in the second quarter of 2010. Over the last 12 months, home values decreased 1.6 percent, and during the last five years, home values declined 9.0 percent.

*Middle Atlantic Division (NJ, NY, PA): increased 0.6 percent (2.6 percent, annualized) in the second quarter of 2010. Over the last 12 months, home values increased 1.0 percent, and during the last five years, home values increased 7.1 percent.

Conventional Mortgage Home Price Index Information

*The CMHPI Purchase-Only Series includes only property values based on home purchases with a conventional mortgage in its calculation. Freddie Mac also produces a CMHPI Classic Series that includes data from both home purchase transactions and mortgage refinancings, with the latter values based on appraisals. Generally, because appraisals are backwards looking through the use of recent comparable property transactions, the Classic Series will typically lag changes in the Purchase-Only series.

*Unlike other home price indexes based on mean or median values of homes sold during a given period, the CMHPI is constructed using regression techniques from observations of actual sales prices or appraised values of the same homes over time. The street addresses of properties that serve as collateral for mortgages are processed using software certified by the United States Postal Service to create a uniform address format and are then matched to identify consecutive transactions on the same property. There are currently more than 44 million records in the repeat-transactions database used to construct the classic Conventional Mortgage Home Price Index – this database includes transactions on one-family detached and townhome properties serving as collateral on loans originated through the second quarter of 2010 and purchased by Freddie Mac or Fannie Mae by July 30, 2010.

Freddie Mac publishes the CMHPI each quarter. Index values and growth rates for the classic series are available for the nation as a whole as well as for the nine Census divisions, the 50 states and the District of Columbia, and 392 metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) and metropolitan divisions; index values and growth rates for the purchase-only series are available for the nation and nine Census divisions. All of the CMHPI series can be found on Freddie Mac’s web site, www.freddiemac.com/finance/cmhpi/.

Freddie Mac was established by Congress in 1970 to provide liquidity, stability and affordability to the nation’s residential mortgage markets. Freddie Mac supports communities across the nation by providing mortgage capital to lenders. Over the years, Freddie Mac has made home possible for one in six homebuyers and more than five million renters.

Source: Freddie Mac

By AnnaMaria Andriotis of SmartMoney

Move over Las Vegas and Phoenix. The foreclosure crisis is entering a second phase, moving into smaller metropolitan areas.

During the first half of this year, 74% of metropolitan areas posted year-over-year increases in foreclosure activity, according to RealtyTrac. In total, more than 1.6 million properties have foreclosure filings, up 8.3% from the first half of 2009.

Although Sun Belt cities such as Las Vegas, San Bernardino, Calif., and Phoenix each recorded upwards of 50,000 foreclosure filings, filings have eased in those areas since the first half of 2009.

Instead, areas such as McAllen, Texas, and Spokane, Wash., have experienced spikes in foreclosures because of extended high unemployment and pay cuts, says Rick Sharga, senior vice president at RealtyTrac. (He projects that foreclosures will peak next year before they decline.)

In general, these five metropolitan areas experienced a relatively small number of foreclosures compared with the rest of the country, but they have registered the biggest increases so far this year.

McAllen-Edinburg-Mission, Texas

• Number of filings (Jan.-June 2010): 1,551
• Percentage increase over 2009′s first half: 230%

Rising unemployment and widespread subprime lending during the housing bubble are the primary factors contributing to foreclosures in this area. Unemployment is higher than the national average, at 12.2% as of June, up from 11.2% in June 2009, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Few industries exist in this area. “A big problem is that they haven’t had a lot of big employers and the manufacturing and construction industries there have been hit,” says Don Baylor, senior policy analyst at the Center for Public Policy Priorities, a nonpartisan, nonprofit think tank in Austin, Texas.

Construction jobs have plummeted as permits for new housing units fell to 1,769 year-to-date, from 3,397 during the same period in 2007, according to the Census Bureau.

Residents are still grappling with the fallout from widespread subprime lending. In 2006, subprime loans accounted for 26.8% of mortgages in McAllen-Edinburg-Mission, the most popular area for subprime mortgages in the country, according to First American LoanPerformance.

Kennewick-Richland-Pasco, Wash.

• Number of filings (Jan.-June 2010): 206
• Percentage increase over 2009′s first half: 217%

Kennewick’s unemployment rate stands at 6.2%, down from 6.7% at this time last year and significantly lower than the national rate. Values for existing single-family homes fell only slightly from a median sale price of $169,200 in 2007 to $167,100 in 2009, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR).

So what’s contributing to the rise in foreclosures? “The problem for people who are losing their houses is that their mortgages are haunting them, either because their income has dropped and they can’t handle the mortgage, or much more likely, the mortgage rate adjusted upward and they can’t afford the mortgage any longer,” says Warren Bland, professor emeritus of economic geography at California State University, Northridge. Builders are reacting to the spike in foreclosures; permits for new housing fell to 508 during the first half of this year compared with 706 in the same period in 2006.

• Ready to move? Browse listings

Another city in Washington — Spokane — has seen a big increase in foreclosure filings, up 103%, in part because borrowers have been intentionally defaulting on their mortgages once their homes fell underwater, Bland says. Median sale prices for existing homes dropped from $193,800 in 2007 to $170,100, according to preliminary NAR data for the first quarter.

Gulfport-Biloxi, Miss.

• Number of filings (Jan.-June 2010): 528
• Percentage increase over 2009′s first half: 153%

Rising foreclosures are another aftershock from Hurricane Katrina. The federal aid that was distributed in this region fueled construction of new homes and rebuilding of old ones that coincided with the 2006-07 housing bubble, says Ross DeVol, executive director of economic research at the Milken Institute, an independent think tank. Increased construction led to a speculative fervor that prices would continue to rise, leading consumers to buy properties at unreasonably high levels.

• MSN Money: Believe it or not, a housing shortage

The median sale price of existing homes dropped from $154,400 in 2007 to $128,800, as of the first quarter of 2010, according to the NAR. With values plummeting, many homeowners were underwater and ended up doing a short sale or walking away from the property, Bland says.

The unemployment rate is 9.2%, up from 8% in June 2009, in part because of the downturn in the tourism industry, including casinos, which are a large employer in Gulfport-Biloxi, DeVol says. This area’s woes may not be over and could actually worsen in the near term after the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico; in addition to keeping tourists away from the region, it could also affect residents employed by the oil industry if they find themselves out of work should the ban on BP drilling continue, Bland says.

Baltimore-Towson, Md.

• Number of filings (Jan.-June 2010): 12,027
• Percentage increase over 2009′s first half: 130%

In 2008, Maryland’s governor signed into law changes that halted the state’s foreclosures. Since that moratorium expired, the number of foreclosures has been rising because of the growing backlog of homes with unpaid mortgages, says Margaret McFarland, director of the Colvin Institute of Real Estate Development at the University of Maryland. Median sale prices for existing homes dropped to $234,900 during the first quarter, from $286,100 in 2007.

• Find rock-bottom mortgage rates

Compounding declining home values is the unemployment rate, which stands at 7.9%, up slightly from 7.8% in June 2009. “Baltimore doesn’t have an economy that’s turning around yet,” she says, adding that the city’s larger underlying problem is structural unemployment — jobs that aren’t coming back. This issue predates this last recession, starting two decades ago when the manufacturing and port-related industries started leaving. The major industries now are academic and medical, including Johns Hopkins University and the University of Maryland. Employees at the latter have incurred pay cuts, which McFarland says could affect mortgage payments, as well.

Barnstable Town, Mass.

• Number of filings (Jan.-June 2010): 1,403
• Percentage increase over 2009′s first half: 93%

Rising foreclosures in Barnstable, the largest community on Cape Cod, are occurring because many homeowners are underwater and can no longer afford to make payments, says Ross Joly, president and CEO of Coldwell Banker Joly, McAbee & Weinert Realty in Cape Cod. The median sale price of existing homes dropped to $325,600 from $384,700 in 2007.

Subprime mortgages were widespread during the boom here, accounting for about 30% of mortgages in the area, he says. “One of the reasons Barnstable county is up [in foreclosures] is because of financing that took place from mortgage companies on the Cape,” he says, adding that lenders were  overfinancing, giving borrowers up to $100,000 more than they needed to buy a home.

Unemployment is up at 8.1%, compared with 7.4% last June, in part because of a decline in construction activity. Tourism-related jobs also have been affected because of fewer vacationers, a trend that’s just starting to turn around this summer.

Opelika is a city in and the county seat of Lee County in the east central part of the U.S. state of Alabama. It is a principal city of the Auburn-Opelika Metropolitan Area. The population of Opelika is 27,443.

There has been a lot of foreclosures in Fort Smith which means you can buy cheap real estate there.

Fort Smith is the second-largest city in the U.S. state of Arkansas and one of the two county seats of Sebastian County.With an estimated population of 85,544 in 2009, it is the principal city of the Fort Smith, Arkansas-Oklahoma Metropolitan Statistical Area, a region of 293,063 residents which encompasses the Arkansas counties of Crawford, Franklin, and Sebastian, and the Oklahoma counties Le Flore and Sequoyah.

Home mortgage rates and real estate news – CNNMoney.com