Overall Foreclosure Activity Near Five-Year Low

Irvine, CA, April 12, 2012 -- The number of foreclosure filings in March fell to the lowest level since July 2007, according tracking firm RealtyTrac.

However, first time foreclosure starts rose 7% in March compared to February.

Overall filings, which include default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions, dropped 4% compared with February, the company said. They fell 17%, compared with a year ago.

However, it's likely many more foreclosures on are on the way, RealtyTrac said.

“There are hairline cracks in the dam, evident in the sizable foreclosure activity increases in judicial foreclosure states over the past several months, along with an increase in foreclosure starts in many judicial and nonjudicial states in March,” Brandon Moore, chief executive officer of RealtyTrac, said in a news release.

“The dam may not burst in the next 30 to 45 days,” he said, “but it will eventually burst, and everyone downstream should be prepared for that to happen — both in terms of new foreclosure activity and new short sale activity.”

In March, foreclosure filings were reported on 198,853 U.S. properties. Total monthly filings haven’t been below 200,000 since July 2007.