Stephen A. Harlan, Esq.

Foreclosure filings, including default notices, auction sale notices, and bank repossessions, increased 5.11 percent across the country in October, according to the latest report from RealtyTrac.

That's a 24.55 percent increase over October 2007, and represents that one out of every 452 households in the United States has been subject to some stage of the foreclosure process.

The number of foreclosures would be much higher, but for foreclosure-prevention laws recently enacted in states such as California. These new laws provide for a longer waiting period, thereby delaying when homes fall into foreclosure - and they're mostly seen as delaying the inevitable for those troubled homeowners.

Nevada ranked first in the nation yet again with the greatest level of foreclosure activity. Georgia dropped from fifth to sixth nationwide.

Last month, the number of foreclosures increased in Georgia by 6.46 percent. Still, that's 12.79 percent below the level seen last October, with only one out of every 391 homes affected by foreclosure.

We'd love to be your real estate closing attorneys in Atlanta Georgia. Want to know more? Contact us and we'll be happy to discuss how Harlan and Associates can be of service to you!

Five, originally uploaded by Tampen.

New home construction dropped dramatically in September, according to the latest report by the U.S. Commerce Department.

Total housing starts, a forward-looking indicator of the housing market, fell 6.3 percent last month. That's 31 percent below the pace of construction in September 2007 and the lowest reading of the index in 17 years.

Economists had predicted a drop of only 1.7 percent.

Single-family housing starts took the greatest hit, falling 12 percent from last month and almost 42 percent from last year.

In the South, total housing starts rose by 0.5 percent, though they were still 32.5 percent below last year's numbers. Single-family starts, however, dropped 6.3 percent in September and were 42.3 percent lower than September 2007.

As bad as housing starts were in September, the numbers for issued building permits were even worse. Total applications for building permits fell 8.3 percent in September to a 27-year low.

With home prices continuing to fall, the numbers of foreclosures increasing, and a credit market that's in shambles, homebuilders are doing everything they can to reign in construction to weather what they feel will almost certainly be a deeper downturn in the real estate market.

We'd love to be your real estate closing attorneys in Atlanta Georgia. Want to know more? Contact us and we'll be happy to discuss how Harlan and Associates can be of service to you!

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The Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller index, released today, showed home prices dropping by a record amount in July, although the pace of monthly declines seems to be slowing.

The 20-city index fell 0.9 percent in July and is down 16.3 percent from last year. That’s the largest drop in the index since it began in 2000.

The 10-city fared no better, with prices dropping 1.1 percent from June and 17.5 percent since July 2007, which is the biggest decline in the 21-year history of the index.

Overall, home prices have fallen nearly 20 percent nationwide since peaking in 2006.

While the picture remains bleak for future home prices, there is some good news in the latest report: the prices are dropping less and less across the country each month, though there is still no evidence of a bottom.

The usual suspects remained on top of the index: According to the report, Las Vegas, Phoenix and Miami experienced the greatest price declines at 29.9, 29.3 and 28.2 percent respectively.

Home prices continued to tread water in Atlanta with the change in home prices actually showing a small appreciation of 0.4 percent from June to July. Still, prices were down 8.2 percent from last year.

We’d love to be your closing attorneys in Atlanta. Want to know more? Contact us and we’ll be happy to discuss how Harlan and Associates can be of service to you!

Polar Bear Plunge 2007: Plunge Zone, originally uploaded by Earl - What I Saw 2.0.

Lost in the noise of the government bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the collapse of Lehman Brothers, but RealtyTrac released its foreclosure report for August last Friday.

Foreclosure filings, including delinquency notices, auction sale notices, and bank repossessions increased 12 percent from July, and were up 27 percent from a year ago. That's one foreclosure filing for every 416 homes.

The 27 percent year-to-year increase represents a more modest jump than last month, which saw a spike of over 50 percent over July 2007. This is primarily due to new legislation in several states which has had the effect of slowing the rate of foreclosure.

Massachusetts, for example, enacted a 90-day waiting period before commencing foreclosure - and the number of foreclosures dropped in the state by 46 percent compared with last year.

Nevada, once again, led the country in foreclosures, with one out of every 91 homes in some stage of foreclosure in August.

Georgia was again the state with the sixth-highest rate of foreclosures as one in every 442 homes was in foreclosure. Still, that represents an overall decrease in the number of foreclosures in the state: a decline of 12.98 percent from last month, and a decline of 10.98 percent from last year.

While the foreclosure problem that Georgia faces is still significant, any improvement is welcome indeed.

We'd love to be your Georgia Closing Attorneys. Want to know more? Contact us and we'll be happy to discuss how Harlan and Associates can be of service to you!

Nationwide sales of existing homes rose 3.1 percent off a ten year low last month, according to the latest National Association of Realtor report.

It's the highest level of existing home sales in five months.

Still, resales were well below July 2007 - which are down 13.2 percent nationwide.

The rise in sales was more than forecast and comes on the heels of an encouraging Pending Home Sales repost issued earlier this month.

Driving the rise in the numbers of existing home sales is a significant drop in home prices. According to the NAR, the median price of an existing home has slipped 7.1 percent from last year to $212,400.00.

The overall outlook for housing still remains grim: while the recent increases in the number of pending and existing home sales are encouraging, increasing numbers of foreclosures, a tougher economic environment, tighter lending standards, and a glut of inventory continue to weigh on the market.

In fact, total housing inventory rose 3.9 percent last month to a record 11.2-month supply of homes for sale. The NAR states that that a 5 to 6 month supply of homes is an indicator of a stable housing market.

In the South, existing home sales actually fell 0.5 percent last month for a year-over-year decline of 18.1 percent. The median home price also slipped 3.5 percent to $179,300.00.

We'd love to be your Real Estate Lawyers in Atlanta. Want to know more? Contact us and we'll be happy to discuss how Harlan and Associates can be of service to you!

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