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1 in 117 Florida homes are in foreclosure

On Behalf of | Oct 20, 2012 | Firm News, Home Foreclosure

Earlier in the week we talked about how aggressive Florida creditors are when it comes to foreclosure. The economy is still far from a complete recovery and it can be difficult for Florida homeowners to pay off their mortgages, keep up with their bills and keep their homes. Nothing evidences this more than a recent report that shows Florida has the highest rate of foreclosures in the United States; approximately one in 117 homes are being foreclosed.

One of the reasons why Florida has had such high numbers of foreclosures, at least within recent months, is because of the requirements banks and other mortgage holders must comply with before they can start a foreclosure proceeding. Because Florida lenders must have a court sign off on any request to put a home in foreclosure, there has been a back up of cases that were waiting on a judge’s signature. Now that they have been signed off, there has been an increase in the number of foreclosures from August to September.

Before the housing-market bubble burst, there were approximately 34,000 foreclosures in the initial stages across the country. A mere four years later in April 2009, the number had jumped to 203,000. Fortunately, this number has slowly been decreasing, but Florida has seen higher numbers of initial foreclosures than any other state, at least in the last month.

It is expected that by the end of the year, there will be approximately 675,000 foreclosed homes in the country, a far cry from the 800,000 completed foreclosures last year.

Though this information may look bleak to residents of Orange County, not every home need be foreclosed. Working closely with a bankruptcy attorney may help homeowners save their homes and escape from a seemingly-insurmountable amount of debt.

Source: ABC Action News, “Florida’s foreclosure rate highest in country as US foreclosure filings hit 5-year low in September,” Marcy Gordon, Oct. 11, 2012.

Within our practice, we have helped numerous people who were threatened with home foreclosure. Find out more by stopping by our website.

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