Homebuyers snatched up repossessed homes at an impressive clip this year, but that doesn’t mean the Sacramento region’s housing troubles are easing. That’s because lenders might be foreclosing on homes faster than they can sell them.
Banks and other mortgage-holders have unloaded 18,491 of the 23,572 homes they repossessed during the past two years in the four-county region, according to MDA DataQuick, a San Diego-based real estate information company. The sales rate for bank-owned homes is much higher than last year, largely due to discount prices drawing buyers into the market.
“We’re burning through them at a faster rate,” DataQuick analyst Andrew LePage said. “Otherwise, they’d be stacking up really high right now.”
But the inventory of foreclosed homes isn’t dropping. The backlog of unsold repossessed homes has actually grown in the past year, to about 5,000. That number includes homes repossessed over a two-year span prior to Aug. 1 that didn’t sell by Oct. 20 (allowing a reasonable period to spruce up and market them for sale). The backlog has increased from about 3,300 at the same time last year, DataQuick said.