Foreclosure sales rise sharply in Las Vegas

Foreclosure sales bounced back to levels not seen since the "robo-signing" scandal that prompted lenders to call for a moratorium last fall, Discovery Bay, Calif.-based Foreclosure Radar reported Tuesday.

The number of Las Vegas homes sold to third parties on the courthouse steps rose to 388 in January, a 35.7 percent increase from the previous month, while 1,517 went back to the bank as real estate-owned, or REOs, up 43.2 percent, the foreclosure tracking website reported.

Notices of default, which start foreclosures, increased 7.2 percent in January to 3,923, though they're down 17.1 percent from the same month a year ago.

Trustee sale notices, which set the auction date and serve as the homeowner's final notice before the sale, numbered 3,240 in January, down 23.6 percent from December, but up 32.3 percent from a year ago.

ForeclosureRadar found significant increases in both properties that went back to the bank and those sold to third parties in Arizona, California, Nevada, Oregon and Washington. As a result, REO inventories increased everywhere except Oregon, where banks sold more homes than they took back.

"What's interesting this month is the activity on the courthouse steps," said Mark Skilling, chief operating officer of ForeclosureRadar.com. "We saw those numbers increase quite a bit. It brings us back to October of last year before the robo-signers and lenders' moratorium. The banks were postponing everything and investors were down there twiddling their thumbs for the most part."

The inventory of bank-owned homes in Las Vegas remained steady in January at 9,353, compared with 9,080 in December. It's up about 20 percent from 7,809 in January 2010. These are properties that have been sold back to the bank at the trustee sale and the bank has yet to sell them to a third party.

On a positive note, the increase in foreclosures comes just in time to provide a fresh supply of entry-level homes for the spring buying season, ForeclosureRadar Chief Executive Sean O'Toole said.

The published bid for trustee sales in Las Vegas -- typically the balance due at the original date of sale -- was $270,000 in January. The opening bid was $163,000 and the winning bid was $164,000, down 6.6 percent from a year ago.

Time to foreclose -- or the average number of days between the notice of default filing and the final sale at auction for sales that occurred in January -- was 260 days, about the same as a year ago. The time between the final sale at auction and when the property was resold by the bank or third party was 168 days, compared with 153 days in January 2010.

Contact reporter Hubble Smith at hsmith@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0491.