HOUSINGNEWS REPORT
A RISING TIDE IN HOUSTON
HOUSTON MSA FORECLOSURE ACTIVITY
FORECLOSURE STARTS
BANK REPOSSESSIONS (REO)
7,000
6,000
5,000
4,000
3,000
2,000
1,000
0
don’t have a way to get it right all the time. We decided it’s not worth the risk,” he explained. Considering that Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the FHA granted Houston metro homeowners a 90-day foreclosure moratorium after Harvey, it comes as no surprise that investors were skipping the auctions. Data from ATTOM shows Houston foreclosure activity dropping sharply immediately following the hurricane. In September 2017, foreclosure activity in the metro area dropped 46 percent from August and was down 61 percent year- over-year. The year-over-year increases have continued through January 2018, although there was a month-to-month spike of 188 percent in January — an indication that lenders may be ramping back up on foreclosures.
“After Harvey a lot of those investors who used to buy on the courthouse steps stopped buying. The biggest reason, you buy a house but the only thing you see is on the outside. Now you don’t know if it’s vacant because it was flooded or because it is a foreclosure.”
AARON AMUCHASTEGUI PRINCIPAL HOMEROCK LLC
HomeRock LLC had Houston set on his radar of places to invest.
the number of foreclosures up for bid, as well as the number of bidders attending the trustee’s sales has gone down noticeably. “After Harvey a lot of those investors who used to buy on the courthouse steps stopped buying. The biggest reason, you buy a house but the only thing you see is on the outside. Now you don’t know if it’s vacant because it was flooded or because it is a foreclosure. Investors are saying they
“We had a plan to have over 100 houses over 24 months. Now we don’t expect to acquire any,” Amuchastegui said. “We were just getting heavily into Houston when it happened. Since Harvey there’s been a lot of big market changes.”
One of those big changes he noticed on the courthouse steps were that
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MARCH 2018 | ATTOM DATA SOLUTIONS
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