The Olympian

More homeowners face losing house

By Jim Szymanski | The Olympian • Published September 23, 2007

South Sound homeowners are falling behind in their mortgage payments at a faster rate than last year, but the problem is not nearly as serious as it is in other parts of the nation.

“We’re bucking the trends nationally,” said Dennis Rose, president of the Washington Association of Realtors. “The Pacific Northwest has been an island unto itself. The economy is good.”

Regardless, records maintained by the Thurston County Auditor’s Office show that some county residents are feeling the pinch of keeping up with their mortgage payments.

• So far this year — through Wednesday of last week — 438 mortgage holders in Thurston County had been notified that their houses could be put up for auction because of past-due monthly payments. That’s up about 53 percent from the same point in 2006, when there were 286 cases.

• The 438 notices of trustee sales issued through Wednesday exceeded the 435 issued in the county for all of 2006. The notices make the foreclosure process official and give homeowners 90 days to make back payments, including property taxes and fees, to save the home from going to auction.

Still, statewide data from the Mortgage Bankers Association show that homeowners in Washington have done far better than those nationwide in keeping up with their mortgage payments. The national association does not keep foreclosure records by county.

The mortgage bankers’ data show that:

• Washington ranked 47th nationally in delinquency rates as a percentage of residential properties at the end of June, one of the lowest rates in the country.

• Mortgages past due in the state represented 2.62 percent of all mortgages, compared with 5.06 percent for the nation at the end of June.

In recent months, homeowners increasingly have fallen behind on payments as interest rates on adjustable-rate mortgages rose and the housing market slowed, making it more difficult to sell their homes.

As a result, lenders have eliminated the liberal terms of a few years ago, when buyers could qualify for a home loan with no money down.