The 1% this Week #29
Image: Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images / September 15, 2011 LA Times
By Steve Askin
More than 30,000 Los Angeles County homes still face foreclosure threats or have already been seized by banks as their owners struggle to cope with more than $14 billion in mortgage debt, a new analysis by Good Jobs LA reveals. These homes include:
- 9247 foreclosed, bank-owned properties.
- 2209 foreclosed and sold by the mortgage holders.
- 13,444 whose owners have received a notice that the bank intends to auction off the property.
- 8219 whose owners have received foreclosure warning notices.
The recent news reports about an “easing” foreclosure crisis bring no comfort to the more than 30,000 LA County families facing underwater mortgages held by the same banking giants that did so much to crash our economy nearly five years ago.
And the same big banks that led us into crisis continue to top the foreclosure lists, an analysis by Good Jobs LA finds. That “Who’s Who” of big banks is led by Wells Fargo, JP Morgan Chase and Bank of America. Including banks they gobbled up during the crisis, these three giants account for at least 30% of LA County foreclosure filings, according to data obtained from a leading real estate market tracking service, ForeclosureRadar.com.
- Wells Fargo: 4576 foreclosure-related filings covering a reported $1.82 billion in mortgage debt.
- JP Morgan Chase: 3855 filings covering $1.78 billion in mortgage debt.
- Bank of America: 1357 filings covering $507 million in mortgage debt.
2012 Total Foreclosure Filings and Mortgage Debt by Bank, Including Acquired Institutions
| BANK OF AMERICA |
1352 |
$507,156,996 |
|
|
|
BANK OF AMERICA |
1248 |
$448,354,830 |
|
|
COUNTRYWIDE (AMERICA’S WHOLESALE LENDER) |
55 |
$30,149,218 |
|
|
FIRST FRANKLIN |
22 |
$10,135,250 |
|
|
MERRILL LYNCH |
27 |
$18,517,698 |
| JP MORGAN CHASE |
3855 |
$1,781,065,212 |
|
|
|
BANK ONE NA |
1 |
$192,000 |
|
|
BEAR STEARNS |
71 |
$33,484,690 |
|
|
EMC MTG |
212 |
$95,356,975 |
|
|
JP MORGAN CHASE |
2360 |
$1,000,504,101 |
|
|
LONG BEACH MTG |
80 |
$31,527,538 |
|
|
WASHINGTON MUTUAL |
1131 |
$619,999,908 |
| WELLS FARGO |
4576 |
$1,824,389,634 |
|
|
|
AMERICA’S SERVICING CO |
523 |
$219,194,526 |
|
|
WACHOVIA |
137 |
$78,612,205 |
|
|
WELLS FARGO |
3916 |
$1,526,582,903 |
These numbers probably understate the contributions of the three banking giants to our county’s foreclosure crisis. The list of 33,119 foreclosure filings on which our numbers are based includes 9182 properties for which no lender was listed. The numbers may also overstate the total number of properties facing foreclosure, because properties which move quickly through the complex foreclosure process may appear more than once. (For example, if the bank sends out a notice in July that the owner has defaulted and then takes possession of the property in December, it will probably be listed at least twice.)
Despite these limitations, the foreclosure data paints a devastating picture of the crisis facing LA County homeowners.
