Fewer Owners Under Water .. Fact or Crap

I just received an email linking me to an article by RIS Real Estate article which stated that fewer home owners are underwater in their mortgages. This at first sounded like good news but then it went on to qualify that news by saying that this is more likely not the cause of an improved real estate market but because there are more homeowners loosing their home to foreclosure.

I had to stop and think about that for a moment... Is this news at all? and if it is news what is it actually saying? As I see it there are fewer home owners because of foreclosure so of course there would be fewer homeowners underwater. This is like reporting the obvious.

Now if homes are being foreclosed the negative equity in these homes is actually being transfered from the homeowner to the bank and investor and I say is this news? No because if you have been in the business the last year we can see what prices homes have dropped because of the number of foreclosures.

I think this article is a bunch of crap not fact... What do you think.