Four percent of homes in foreclosure by end of year

Morning News story gets analysis wrong, though

Four percent? That’s the estimate on where the housing world is headed. That is, barring an economic regulatory reform package that also offers homeowner some relief. Anyway, here’s where we’re at right now, along with projections for the future:

Nearly 3 million homeowners, or about 6.3 percent, were behind in their monthly mortgage payments in January. By some estimates, more than 2 million families will have their homes foreclosed on this year. The number of homeowners facing foreclosure climbed almost 60 percent in January compared with the same month a year ago.

Those 2 million? That’s just over 4 percent of the total of about 48 million homeowners.

And, if those estimates are anywhere close to accurate, the Street has a ways to go before finding its bottom.

Unfortunately, the author of the story, Will Deener, says that getting mortgage defaults behind us, will allow this wonderful benefit:

Then the banks, brokerage firms and mortgage companies will start packaging those mortgages again and selling them to institutions, which is how the system is supposed to work.

Uhh, no, Will. Wrong. Exactimento wrong.
That’s how the system was gamed to get us to this point in the first place. The “system” as it currently stands is broken.

Oh, and Dallas Morning News? Why isn’t this run in hardcopy, or identified online, as news analysis or a column, which it clearly is. (Going by a column in hardcopy today, which is NOT run ragged-right on line justification like columns are supposed to be, I am assuming this one, too, if/when it appears in hardcopy, will be run as a straight financial news story.)

Oh, and why isn’t the Snooze posting e-mail addys for most of its freelance contributors anymore? I’m guessing some of them might not like it, but, the Snooze could either set them up with corporate e-mail addresses or else simply say that’s part of the price of freelancing.