Bank Repossession of Homes Sets New Record in August

   The foreclosures keep coming and Americans continue to get their homes repossessed by banks. According to the AP article, a record ~100,000 homes were repo'ed in August. A salient paragraph from the article is pasted below:

"Notices of Default, which are the first step in the foreclosure process, are up slightly but mostly thanks to a jump in California, where the numbers had been artificially low of late, as banks tried to modify borrowers.
"With respect to the NOD increase, I think it is the modification redefault wave beginning to build and new modifications slowing to a trickle, indicating banks have lost their primary borrower re-leveraging tool," says mortgage industry consultant Mark Hanson."

   JP Morgan is pushing back the housing recovery to 2014 but I think that's still way too optimistic. The foreclosure contagion isn't something that'll reverse itself within the space of a few years. It's going to be a long grind of at least two decades before the real estate market regains its footing. I've always looked at any market as a function of fear and greed which impel buyers and sellers. Right now, there's a lot of fear and a lot of sellers but not much in the way of greedy buyers. The recovery is coming but believe you me, it ain't going to be as soon as 2014. Try 2024 before speculative greed is rewarded once again by the real estate market.

   The original article is linked here: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Bank-Repossession-of-Homes-cnbc-1047161091.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=main&asset=&ccode=