It’s been a tough year for many Dallas-Ft Worth homeowners, we know. And the increasingly dour statistics are starting to reflect that fact.

According to the Associated Press :

A rising proportion of fixed-rate home loans made to people with good credit are sinking into foreclosure, adding to concerns about the strength of the economic recovery.

Driven by rising unemployment, such loans accounted for nearly one-third of new foreclosures last quarter. That compares with 21 percent a year ago, when high-risk subprime loans made during the housing boom were the main reason for default.

At the same time, the proportion of homeowners with a mortgage who were either behind on their payments or in foreclosure hit a record high for the ninth straight quarter, rising to 9.64 percent.

In Texas, the delinquency rate at the end of the third quarter was 9.84 percent, the Mortgage Bankers Association said Thursday. Nearly 2 percent of those loans were in foreclosure by the end of September, compared with 4.5 percent nationally.

Foreclosures in Dallas-Fort Worth rose 23 percent this year, to a record 61,676 filings.

It’s tough to spin it — these numbers are ugly. But until things brighten, all we can do is help you make the most of it, and capitalize on hidden opportunities that arrived amid the black crowds of this crisis.

So let’s look at some silver linings starting to emerge in the current housing market:

• There are more homes available, for less money.  It’s simple supply and demand.  So if (and we understand that this is a big "If") you can sell, or are a first time homebuyer and don’t need to sell, the current market is the mother of all buyer’s markets.
• The slumping market increases the likelihood of government help — say, for example, the low interest rates and homebuyers tax credits currently available .
• We’ll hit bottom soon. Just as prices couldn’t rise forever, there will be an end to the slide as the economy as a whole continues to recover. Prices have now been falling for three years.

Contact our Texas mortgage experts for more information. We’ll help you get through.

Tags: foreclosures, Home Loans, home purchase, housing market, tax credit

This entry was posted on Friday, December 4th, 2009 at 12:48 pm and is filed under Home Loans, Mortgage News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.