Salem Oregon Foreclosure update

Foreclosures, short sales and bargains on the brain.

I get this. Buyers want deals and with the national news out there with some areas hit by tons of foreclosures, it is easy to see why buyers think every home is in foreclosure.  So here’s the deal…well at least the deal for the 30 minutes it will take me to write this post…Salem Oregon still doesn’t have a lot of foreclosures…relatively speaking.

7.5%

On the MLS that is how many homes are designated as a short sale or foreclosed home.  So that means 92.5% of homes for sale are just plain Jane real estate transactions. Now this percentage has gone up this year as it was at 6.8% in January of 2009 and with our current Salem Oregon unemployment rate of 11.4%, I can’t see how it won’t continue to climb.

I can also tell you, as someone that gets the list for homes being served with notice of defaults, that many of those homes aren’t listed on the MLS.  There are a lot of distressed properties out there, flying under the radar.  So what does our current foreclosure trending look like for Salem Oregon?

You’ll see that nice big peak in January with the nice drop-off.  The drop off was nice, but what happens next remains to be seen. As some of you know there was a moratorium on foreclosures by Fannie and Freddie, and many of the ‘big guys” such as Citi and Chase followed suit, holding off on foreclosures until President Obama presented his stimulus package. That moratorium ended March 31, 2009, so whether we will see a spike in the next few months…possible.

With the end of the moratorium and our high unemployment rate, we could see a real surge in foreclosures by later this summer, early fall.  Whether or not our fellow Oregonians make it depends on how well they were able to save to weather this employment market.  I have definitely seen some homes in short sale that were the result of “buying a champagne home on a beer budget” but I am seeing a lot of true hardships as well.  These foreclosures are not necessarily about people spending beyond their means anymore.

If you have bargains on the brain and want to learn about purchasing a Salem Oregon  short sale or foreclosure, just email me and ask to be placed on the list (tell me what city you want, by the way).