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Utah has ninth-highest foreclosure rate in the United States
January 25, 2007

With more than 13,000 properties entering some stage of foreclosure in 2006, Utah has the ninth-highest foreclosure rate in the nation, according to year-end data from RealtyTrac’s 2006 U.S. Foreclosure Market Report. The report, which was released today, showed Utah foreclosures were up 13 percent from 2005 and there was one foreclosure filing for every 59 households.

Nationally, foreclosures were up 42 percent from 2005 and there was a foreclosure rate of one foreclosure filing for every 92 households. The RealtyTrac data indicated that Utah’s neighbors, Colorado and Nevada, also had foreclosure problems. At one per every 33 and 41 households, the two posted the first and third-highest rates in the country.

“The increase in the number of properties in foreclosure was driven partly by the general slowing of overall housing sales, and partly by the impact of monthly mortgage payments increasing dramatically for homeowners who held some of the riskier types of adjustable rate and sub-prime mortgages,” said James J. Saccacio, chief executive officer of RealtyTrac, in a prepared statement. “As more and more of these loans re-set, we saw a surge to finish the year, with the fourth quarter producing more foreclosure filings than any of the three previous quarters.”

In Utah, Weber County had the highest foreclosure rate in the state with nearly 4 percent of its households in foreclosure. Davis County had the second-highest rate and Salt Lake County came in third. In RealtyTrac’s 2006 foreclosure statistics for the nation’s 100 largest metropolitan statistical areas, Salt Lake City came in at No. 24, with 1 foreclosure filing per every 52 households.

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