Foreclosures Filings Up By 65 Percent In April

Washington, D.C. (AHN) - Foreclosure filings went up by 65 percent in April, while bank seizures rose by more than 50 percent, indicating the continued slump of the U.S. housing industry triggered by the economic slowdown, subprime mortgage crisis and tight credit squeeze.

On the fourth month of 2008, 243,464 homes got at least one foreclosure-related filing, a 4 percent increase compared to March, according to RealtyTrac. It includes default notices, auction sale notices and bank repossessions.

Heaviest hit areas were Nevada, California, Arizona and Florida and metropolitan areas of California and Florida.

Ira Rheingold, executive director of the National Association of Consumer Advocates, told Bloomberg, "Loan modification isn't working... It's extremely difficult for a homeowner to talk to a servicer and even if they do, it's hard to get the servicer to change the terms. You get voice-mail hell, they don't return calls, you can't get a live person on the phone."

The unabated rise in foreclosures are taking place despite the economic relief package and efforts by the federal government to provide relief for distressed homeowners who had to default on their monthly payments.

Over half of the recipients of foreclosure notices were first timers. Rick Sharga, vice president of marketing of RealtyTrac, explained to USA Today, "We're still sitting at roughly the same percentage of loans handled in any way successfully as we were a year ago, and the volume (of foreclosure filings) still keeps going up... It's apparent that what they've tried so far isn't working."

Meanwhile, a bit of good news for the U.S. real estate industry that came out also Wednesday said mortgage applications went up for the second straight week. According to the Mortgage Bankers Association, quoted by the USA Today, mortgage applications for the week ended May 9 inched up by 2.9 percent caused by a rise in demand for home refinancing loans amid interest rate declines.