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Disposal of foreclosures may be the key to a housing market recovery
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Lost in all the talk about a federal bailout plan is this question: How quickly will the government dispose of troubled properties after it takes them over from the nation's financial institutions?
How the government handles the selloff of these properties will be critical to a housing market recovery, says Rob Benware, who knows plenty about foreclosures and how they're impacting the market these days.
Rob is Vice President of Foreclosed Bank Property for Morris and Raper Realtors, an Atlanta-based company that's helping financial institutions sell off new homes acquired through foreclosure. "Will the government move fast or slow in working through the mess?" he wonders. "The quicker that happens, the better for everyone."
The last time we went through this kind of situation - when the Resolution Trust Corp. was formed to dispose of troubled assets held by savings and loans after that '80s debacle - there was plenty of frustration over how quickly the process moved. After all, this is the federal government we are talking about - not an outfit known for moving fast.
Homebuilders and bankers are telling Rob that they think we are in the seventh inning of a nine-inning nightmare, and that the biggest thing holding up a recovery is the glut of foreclosed property competing with new-home and existing-home sellers everywhere. Of course, the worst states are California and Florida, but no part of the country is immune.
"I think the good news is that we seem to be getting towards the tail end of this thing," Rob says. "But there needs to be a sense of urgency about getting these assets disposed of. Until that happens, things just aren't going to change."
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