It looks like foreclosures are winning out over loan modifications, as banks remain more likely to seize real estate, in place of bargaining over it.
Bloomberg News reports that one house out every 409 in the United States received some sort of foreclosure warning letter in the past month. Michelle Meyer, an economist in New York, said that “It’s almost ineveitable that modifications will fail. Over the next several months, we should see REOs [i.e. foreclosures] increase at an accelerated pace.”
One consequence is that more folks may have to consider bankruptcy as an option because of their bank’s stubborness. This pattern is well under way in the Merrimack Valley, and in fact has been spreading out from areas like Lawrence to the Andovers and other suburbs such as Windham, N.H. For now, it look like this trend will only continue.
By Doug Beaton