Housing Rebound Signaled as Banks Resume Foreclosures

U.S. lenders are notifying more delinquent homeowners they face foreclosure, a step toward clearing a backlog of properties and helping to accelerate a housing recovery. Initial notices of foreclosure, the start of the process, jumped 6 percent in the second quarter from a year earlier, the first annual increase since 2009, according to RealtyTrac Inc., a seller of housing market data. Banks at the same time found alternatives to the final step of seizing the home, either by working with the borrower or by agreeing to sell properties for less than what was owed, with repossessions falling 22 percent. “You have to get to the point where the market can heal itself and foreclosures and price adjustments are the only way that can happen,” said Anthony B. Sanders, an economics professor at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia.

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