Florida Repo Houses

Florida is known as the Sunshine State of America. It is a peninsula that pushes into the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico. Today dark clouds of Florida Repo houses are hanging over the region. Florida Repo houses are a curse not only on the state but also on the country. Florida is one of the top offenders as regards foreclosures and is bringing pulling up the average foreclosure figures of the nation. During the first three months of this year of 2008 Florida ranked second as regards foreclosure filings. There were 18,055 foreclosure listings. The majority of these fail to get sold at court auctions and end up as Florida Repo houses.

By Florida Repo houses is meant those houses that have been repossessed by the banks. There are so many Florida Repo houses that the banks are finding it beyond their limits to manage these. As such these Florida Repo houses are lying vacant and causing blight on the state and the immediate locality.

Although the number of foreclosures has dropped by 4% from July to August 2008 the state continues to be one of the top rankers in the country as regards foreclosures. In August there were over 44,000 houses in Florida that were in some state of foreclosure. This means more Florida Repo houses would be flooding the market. All total foreclosure numbers, including Florida Repo houses have increased by 12% since July and an increase of 27% since the August of 2007. In the foreclosure category the maximum activity has been noticed in Florida Repo houses.

Florida Repo houses create multiple problems. The vacant houses attract crime and disease. Vandals sneak in to steal anything they can lay hands on – fittings, fixtures and appliances. Florida Repo houses invite drug peddlers and prostitutes. Florida Repo houses also leads to fire. Those living near such innumerable Florida Repo houses are far from happy. Apart from the safety question the prices of those houses not in foreclosure also plummet. Nobody wants to buy houses in a locality dotted with Florida Repo houses. Stagnant pools breed dangerous mosquitoes in Florida Repo houses. Florida Repo houses are like a curse pock marking Florida.

The latest news from RealtyTrac is that Florida ranks second as regards highest number of foreclosures. In South Florida foreclosure numbers shot up to 11,700 in August. It was a spike of 280% from August 2007 according to Default Research. The real estate market is continuing to struggle, the average prices have been coming down although the inventories have remained relatively stable. In South Florida 2.64% of the houses are under the foreclosure cloud. The national average is 2%. The news is not all bad because although the residential market is wilting, the commercial real estate market is showing signs of picking up.

The banks are offering huge discounts to push off repossessed houses from their inventories and this is having some effect on the sales together with other measures being taken by the federal and state government.