Summary
The industry is searching for some glimmer of hope, some good news; unfortunately, this week it came from a misinformed journalist who poorly researched a story that ended up on the front page of the Phoenix Metro Area's main daily newspaper.
Analysis
The Phoenix Metro market has been on a good roll in the past few weeks. The latest positive news came on Monday when veteran Arizona Republic reporter Catherine Reagor’s front page article (the subject article) suggested the recent Homeowner Affordability and Stability Plan was working. The article starts, “There are signs that the $75 billion federal housing program announced in February is beginning to help some Valley homeowners”, and goes on to cite fewer foreclosures in March and 3,000 pending foreclosure cancellations. As we wrote for clients on Monday, following Ms. Reagor’s article, any positive housing news on the front page is good news for the industry because it boosts the confidence of potential buyers- which will ultimately help in the turnaround. We read the article with some skepticism, knowing the condition of housing market, recently hearing from a number of potential foreclosurees about how the program will not help them, and seeing recent foreclosure trends. Just the previous week, the Arizona Republic headline was “10,635 in trouble” (April 2). The article, written by journalist J. Craig Anderson, tells readers about the record number of notices of trustee sales filed in the month of March.
This week we researched some of the notice of trustee cancellations- something we wonder if Ms. Reagor had done. Notices of trustee sale are recorded instruments, as are the cancellations (Cancellation of Trustee’s Sale), and are available for viewing and purchase online in Maricopa County. Here’s what we found:
-The cancellations are an accumulation of cancellations that occurred from November 2008 to present. They were recorded in February 2009. We are not sure if the reason they were just recorded is that they were only recently filed or if Maricopa’s process for recording delayed public viewing, but the cancellations are from several months- not just February.
-Many of the filings were made by Phoenix attorney Michael A. Bosco Jr. Of the filings we viewed, we found most of the cancellations had one of just a few loan servicing companies listed.
-A similar phenomenon occurred in October 2008, when an even higher number of cancellations were filed.
What do the foreclosure cancellation notices mean in terms of foreclosure trends and the recent federal legislation intended to keep homeowners in their homes? They mean nothing. We cannot glean anything from the notices but that Mr. Bosco is very busy and more than 3,000 homeowners are able to stay in their homes.
The industry is searching for some glimmer of hope, some good news; unfortunately, this week it came from a misinformed journalist who poorly researched a story that ended up on the front page of the Region’s main daily newspaper.
