Foreclosure Sales Drive Oregon market
Written by Theresa Brigleb on Thursday, May 26, 2011
Date: Thursday, May 26, 2011
Sales of homes in some stage of foreclosure continue to account for a large percentage of closed sales.
According to Irvine, Calif.-based RealtyTrac, distressed home sales accounted for 31.71 percent of all first-quarter home sales in Oregon.
All told, there were 2,133 sales of bank-owned homes in Oregon during the first quarter, up from 2,041 in the previous quarter. The average price on distressed properties in the state was $175,957, 24.37 percent below the average sales price on homes not in some stage of foreclosure.
Nationally, distressed sales accounted for 28 percent of U.S. residential home sales, up from 27 percent the previous quarter and down 1.46 percent from a year ago.
“While foreclosure sales continue to account for an unusually high percentage of all residential home sales, sales volume is well off the peak we saw in the first quarter of 2009, when nearly 350,000 foreclosure properties sold to third parties,” said James J. Saccacio, chief executive officer of RealtyTrac. “While this is probably helping to keep home prices relatively stable, it is also delaying the housing recovery. At the first quarter foreclosure sales pace, it would take exactly three years to clear the current inventory of 1.9 million properties already on the banks’ books, or in foreclosure.”
Nevada continued to experience the highest number of distressed home sales with sales of homes in some stage of foreclosure accounting for 53 percent of all first-quarter sales.
Portland Business Journal - by Suzanne Stevens, Web edito