Local news (related to national news)

From ABQ Journal, Sunday, 29 Aug:

Foreclosures Surge
By Richard Metcalf
Journal Staff Writer
29 Aug 2010
More and more homeowners in Albuquerque were falling behind on their mortgage payments in the first half of the year, pushing the metro area dramatically higher in RealtyTrac's rankings of distressed housing markets in the country.

The Irvine, Calif.-based company reports 4,574 households in the metro received some kind of foreclosure-related notice between January and June, almost as many as the 4,970 households receiving one during all of 2009. In all of 2008, only 2,688 households received a notice.

...

"We were slow going into this recession," said Janice McCrary, executive vice president of the Greater Albuquerque Association of Realtors. "This (increase in foreclosure activity) is the lag playing out in our real estate market."

New Mexico's economy is believed to have gone into recession in the fourth quarter of 2008, almost a year after the national economy did. The recession has led to massive job losses, which experts point to as the foremost cause of foreclosures.

In the Albuquerque metro area, the unemployment rate doubled from 4.6 percent at the start of the fourth quarter in 2008 to a high of 9.2 percent at the end of the first quarter of this year. The increase translated into 22,200 local residents losing their jobs.

Fun times ahead!

To see what's going on in your neighborhood, visit RealtyTracs.