No Rest for the Palm Beach County Clerk

Day after day, week after week, month after month and year after year as we all go about our normal course of business the Palm Beach County Clerk is holding foreclosure auctions. Monday though Friday every week they are holding one. And every day the final chapter closes on what is typically a process that has gone on for years. I have one client who has a mortgage north of $900,000 that has not paid a penny on it for over 4 years. One day their property will end up at an auction but probably not for quite a while. The banks are still going after the low hanging fruit and we still have a ways to go before the clerk can take a day off.

The chart above shows you the six-month trend of foreclosures in Palm Beach County which shows the bumpy ride we have been on. This week the actual foreclosure numbers increased slightly from last week but were still well behind the levels we saw the first three weeks on the new year. This week 207 properties were foreclosed upon which was a bit ahead of the 186 we had last week. With that increase we are just ahead of the 6 month average which currently stands at 204. We were however about 22% lower than the 267 units foreclosed on in the same week of 2011.

Third party bidders continue to thrive on the fact that banks are letting more and more properties go for less and letting someone else deal with their headaches. These investors can more efficiently handle these properties and turn them into either cash producing investments or fix and flip projects. This week 17.87% of all auctions went to these third party bidders. For the 12th week in a row this success rate stayed firmly above 15%. Compare that to previous year numbers when during the same period we only saw one week with the success rate above 15%. During the same week in 2011 only 7.12% of auctions went to 3rd party bidders.

Here at “Results Driven Real Estate” we are passionate about the market and love assisting each one of our clients achieve their real estate goals. If we can ever be of help in any way with your needs throughout Palm Beach and Martin Counties please feel free to contact Tom at 561 308-0175 or via e-mail at tom@tompriester.com. It would be my sincere honor to work with you!

Cheers,

Tom Priester   e-PRO

"Results Driven Real Estate"

Keller Williams Realty

561 308-0175

tom@tompriester.com