Home Seizures Decline in First Six Months

Irvine, CA, July 14, 2011 -- Home seizures by banks in the first half of the year fell 30% compared with the same 2010 period, according to tracking firm RealtyTrac.

Banks seized 421,212 homes in the first six months of the year, down from 529,633 between January and June last year.

The decrease reflects lenders taking longer to move against homeowners who have fallen behind on their mortgage payments, RealtyTrac said, as they deal with documentation problems that were revealed last year.

However, the delays have increased the backlog of potential foreclosures.

RealtyTrac estimates that 1 million foreclosure-related notices that should have been filed by banks this year will be pushed to next year.

"The best-case scenario is we don't get back to normal levels of foreclosure activity until 2015, which means the housing market recovery gets delayed by at least a year," said Rick Sharga, a senior vice president at RealtyTrac.