Georgia foreclosure rate rises 31%

The Atlanta Business Chronicle reports that Georgia had the sixth-highest rate of foreclosures in America in May, according to RealtyTrac’s monthly foreclosure report.

The state had 50,685 foreclosures, or one for every 292 households, last month. This marked a jump of 31 percent over May 2009 and a 1.3 percent decline from April 2010.

Foreclosures are defined as default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions.

There were 322,920 foreclosure filings, or one for every 400 households, in the United States in May. This was a 0.45 percent rise over May 2009 and a 3.3 percent drop from April 2010.

“The numbers in May continued and confirmed the trends we noticed in April -- overall foreclosure activity leveling off while lenders work through the backlog of distressed properties that have built up over the past 20 months,” said James J. Saccacio, RealtyTrac CEO, in a statement. “Defaults and scheduled auctions combined increased by 28 percent from 2007 to 2008 and another 32 percent from 2008 to 2009, creating a build-up of delayed bank repossessions. Lenders appear to be ramping up the pace of completing those forestalled foreclosures even while the inflow of delinquencies into the foreclosure process has slowed.”

As you can see things are not getting any better for Georgia as far as home foreclosures goes.