Foreclosures in the Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater area shot up 111 percent in the past year.
According to RealtyTrac, that means one in every 304 Bay area housing units is in foreclosure.
The new numbers rank the Bay area number five in foreclosures for the top 20 largest metropolitan areas in the country.
But Tampa Bay Business Journal Editor Alexis Muellner actually finds some good news in these dismal sounding foreclosure numbers.
“We’ve all being waiting for this last shoe to drop, which has been getting this inventory pushed through… the foreclosures pushed through. And while it may seem like a frustrating thing to see these numbers continue to pop up, we know that Florida’s been hit hard and the fact is that the stuff is working through the system and that’s a positive sign in the end.”
Muellner says the so-called robo-signing scandal – where foreclosures were being conducted without proper paperwork – slowed down the process of getting distressed properties through foreclosure. And, until those homes are processed through the market, a real housing recovery can’t get going.
“A lot of this inventory is finally getting pushed through. And that’s what we need. You need to see this process moving along. That, in the end, means we’ll see a greater light at the end of the tunnel in terms of this housing crisis.”
