housing numbers

[rbetts]

It is reported that roughly 305,000 houses had papers filed in foreclosure proceedings in Sept.  Of these 305k, 62k filings were new default notices (properties being newly foreclosed on v. receiving notice of an auction or so some other activity.)  Here's the link with state-by-state numbers

Comments

[innermonkey]

1.) I think your fraction is inverted (should be $700,000,000/1049k houses)

2.) I was wondering about the last bit myself. If the government ostensibly owns these foreclosed homes, how will it dispose of them? Will it auction them back to the residents, fund a Habitat for Humanity-type program to make sure they're all livable and then move low-income families into them? What about people that lost their homes already and can't qualify for the re-sale or whatever?

It sounds kind of like socialism, and I'm finding myself conflicted between what is a proper function of government and what is necessary to stabilize the American economy.

[rbetts]

Err.. thanks .. I fixed the mis-written division. It is also unclear to me how buying bad debt (or I think more accurately, securities representing combinations of good and bad debt) trickles down to the masses. Or if it does at all. Or if the treasury assumes responsibility for collecting this debt once they purchase it. Or if they are really just insuring it.

If the later (just insurance), then doesn't this severely decrease the motivation of banks to collect what they can? The entire thing is muddled.

Socialism or not .. I sure hope Congress doesn't give the better of a trillion dollars to essentially one person to disburse to his previous coworkers.

[xinie]

Where do I line up for someone to supplement a $670,000 for me?!

[rbetts]

Apparently you can line up in New York .. or from there take the greyhound to DC :-)

On the radio, an NPR source estimated the total houses in foreclosure to be approximately 1 million.

The dollar per property number is still just a very rough estimate for an upper bound.