Even though AA toxic assets are now selling at 65 cents on the dollar compared to 35 cents a year ago, the number of foreclosures in the pipeline in USA matters to the world financial system, because that’s what determines at what point banks can say they are solvent, without everyone bursting out laughing.
By way of explanation, a Bank Repossession (REO) is the final stage of the foreclosure process, that’s the point at which the bank throws you out of your house onto the street. In USA typically three foreclosure notices are required before you end up on the street so when the media reports “X” foreclosure filings in a month, that’s a mix of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd (final) stages, which can be a bit confusing.
You might have thought that in the circumstances, the facts surrounding the “de-housing” of millions of Americans would be something of at least peripheral interest to the elected officials of the US Government? Evidently it’s not; try asking your Congressman how many families got thrown out on the street in his “patch” since the start of the housing bust, he will probably say “that’s classified”, which is another way of saying he couldn’t be bothered to count.
The best source of information in the public domain is RealtyTrac who collect and collate information on filings which happen at a local level. They are a research company so you pay for the information which is not public-domain (so you can’t publish it), although they do release snippets of information that are drip-fed out to the media to promote their services, which appears to be mainly selling houses in foreclosure. Another good source is Mark Hanson Realty, which used to put out very good (free) data, but you have to pay for that now, too. This analysis is based on collating that (public) information.
Add those numbers up, from here and there, and it looks like since the start of 2005 to the end of 2010, three million seven-hundred thousand American families have been kicked out onto the street. At an average of 2.3 people per household that’s 8.5 million Americans who have been directly, physically, affected by the popping of the US Housing Bubble, so far.
That’s about how many civilians were displaced, as in “de-housed” by the US campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, although…
