Arkansas metro areas move up foreclosure list

Of the 211 metro markets monitored by RealtyTrac, the Northwest Arkansas metro area ranked 21st with respect to the highest number of foreclosures per households during the first half of 2011. The Northwest Arkansas area ranked 34th in the 2010 period.

The central Arkansas area ranked 68th, up from 82 in 2010, and the Fort Smith metro area was ranked 116, up from 141 in the 2010 period.

According to Irvine, Calif.-based RealtyTrac, foreclosure activity decreased on a year-over year basis in 178 out of the nation’s 211 metropolitan areas with a population of 200,000 or more.

During the first half of 2011, there were 1.17 million properties in the U.S. in some level of foreclosure, down 29.27% from the 2010 period. There was one property in a foreclosure phase for every 111 U.S. households, according to the RealtyTrac info.

“Foreclosure activity continued to slow in the first half of 2011, especially in the most foreclosure-saturated markets and in markets where the judicial foreclosure process is used,” RealtyTrac CEO James Saccacio said in a statement. “The 20 metro areas with the biggest year-over-year decreases in foreclosure activity were all in states with judicial foreclosure processes — New York, Maryland, Florida, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Illinois.”

Continuing, Saccacio said: “These dramatic decreases indicate the foreclosure pipeline continues to be clogged in many local markets across the country, sometimes by a glut of already-foreclosed properties that are not selling quickly, sometimes by a mountain of improperly filed foreclosures that are blocking the inflow of new foreclosure filings — and sometimes by both.”

Arkansas’ Northwest metro area (Fayetteville-Springdale-Rogers) had 3,430 properties in foreclosure between January and June, down 16.63% compared to the 2010 period. The metro area had one property in a foreclosure phase for every 55 households.

There were 2,880 central Arkansas (Little Rock-North Little Rock-Conway) properties in foreclosure during the first half of 2011, down 10.81% compared to the 2010 period. The metro area had one property in a foreclosure phase for every 104 households.

The Fort Smith metro area had 778 properties in foreclosure during the period, down 4.07% from the 2010 period. The metro area had one property in a foreclosure phase for every 161 households.

Following are the top five U.S. metro areas on the RealtyTrac foreclosure list.
• Las Vegas-Paradise, Nev.: 43,944 foreclosures; one property in foreclosure for every 19 households (1/19); down 17.9% from the 2010 period.

• Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, Ariz.: 60,985; 1/28; down 16.86%

• Modesto, Calif.: 5,824; 1/30; down 27.51%

• Stockton, Calif.: 7,422; 1/31; down 25.77%

• Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, Calif.: 46,959; 1/31; down 26.3%