California foreclosures and how California leadership may deal with them is an important issue. Understanding just how the Golden State found itself dealing with such a large problem in the first place and how it began to experience this problem years before the rest of the country did is an interesting problem. Some of the issue deals with rampant speculation while some of it also deals with a failure of state leadership, it needs to be said.
As it relates to the issue of CA foreclosures and how they increase or decrease (they’ve been increasing for the last few years), it’s worth noting that California, Las Vegas, Florida and other areas all featured extremely vigorous real estate markets for a number of years. With the supply and demand model completely in favor of the seller prices for homes went up, sometimes unreasonably or unrealistically.
California political leadership — just like leadership in most every other state — encouraged this boom in real estate for a number of reasons, including that more people buying more homes meant increasing tax revenues. This encouraged the state and its municipalities to add sometimes-needed services, all on the expectation that the good times would continue to roll on forever. But no real estate boom has ever not been followed by a bust.
When it came to California, the beginnings of such a bust or drop in home prices probably started some time in 2006 though it’s the case that home values were still soft in places like San Diego and elsewhere for about a year prior to that. However, lax lending standards and low-interest rate money kept people coming into the market for a few more years before it finally all began to decline.
That let down in the markets began to really take off in mid-2007. After the financial markets themselves finally went down badly in late 2008, the real estate market out in California ground to a halt. At that point, the rate of increase in CA foreclosures really took off, with the state now featuring six of the top 10 cities in the country in terms of foreclosure. That’s not an enviable record to hold, it must be said.
State leaders have been trying to do certain things aimed at reducing the rate of CA foreclosures over time. They’ve been working with the federal government to get the word out (and to administer) certain programs that home owners can take advantage of to reduce their mortgages, for one. Also, the state has a law on the books (due to expire in 2011) that has added additional time to the foreclosure process.
It’s hoped that with loan modification programs and an extension in time when (it comes to a foreclosure) a diminution in the rate of foreclosure among homeowners who are at least willing to try to keep their homes will occur. Unfortunately, Golden State home values have declined by 30 or more percent, meaning that many own homes worth less than what is owed on them. For them, foreclosure is becoming a first resort rather than a last resort, sadly.
Whether or not there’s ever really truly anything that can be done about the rate of CA foreclosures that the natural movement of the markets themselves won’t accomplish remains to be seen. Some economists believe the foreclosure rate is stabilizing and might even be dropping, hopefully. It would seem that time is the only reliable predictor of that particular observation, though.
Ca foreclosures are very real. If you are down about a Ca foreclosure, then there is help out there, you just need to know where to look. The Internet is a great place to look.
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