California foreclosures near record levels

California foreclosures near record levels
By David Streitfeld, Times Staff Writer
12:25 PM PDT, April 16, 2007




Mortgage foreclosures
click to enlargeThe number of Californians losing their homes to foreclosure rose in the first three months of the year to the highest level in a decade, a real estate information service said today, providing grim evidence that the shake-out in real estate is nowhere near over.

Foreclosures totaled 11,033, up 802% from the placid levels of early 2006, according to DataQuick Information Services in La Jolla. Foreclosures peaked at 15,418 in third-quarter 1996, at the tail end of the last big slowdown in the state. They bottomed out at 637 in the second quarter of 2005, as the most recent boom was cresting.

Tens of thousands of homeowners are being warned that they too are at risk. Notices of default, sent by lenders after about five months of missed payments, reached 46,760 in the first quarter, DataQuick said.

That was a jump of 148% from the first quarter of 2006, and the highest since 47,912 in the second quarter of 1997. The peak for defaults was in the first quarter of 1996, with 61,541.

"I figured they'd go up," said DataQuick analyst John Karevoll. "I didn't figure they'd go up this fast."

The default and foreclosure totals varied widely by area. Generally, the places with the cheapest housing--such as the Inland Empire and Central Valley--fared the worst.

Another problem spot is San Diego County, where the 1,183 foreclosures is the highest since DataQuick began tracking this information in 1988.

Most of the loans going into default now were made at the peak of the boom, when it seemed like the good times would continue forever and lending standards were lax.

In Los Angeles County, the default rate is almost 60% below the first-quarter 1996 peak, DataQuick said, an indication of strength in many sectors of the market.