Jacksonville foreclosure investing gets into a frenzy as home prices continue to fall.
Based on foreclosure sales figures from the Northeast Florida Association of Realtors, 50 percent of all houses sold in Jacksonville in February were short sale properties or homes from Jacksonville foreclosure listings. These types of sales, now classified as lender-mediated sales by real estate professionals, have jumped up by 37 percent.
Distressed sales increased as their median price dropped to $101,850, a whopping fall of 15 percent.
Because of the continued increase in low-priced foreclosure sales and in pre-foreclosures in Jacksonville, prices for all types of homes also continued to fall. As total home sales, including short sales, foreclosure sales and conventional sales, climbed up in February by 7 percent, the median sales price dropped to $135,000, a sharp increase by 14 percent.
The median price for traditional sales was pulled down to $174,995, a drop of 1.7 percent.
As residential foreclosures in Jacksonville continued to increase and as the number of unemployed residents continued to rise, commercial real estate foreclosures also surged. As businesses closed because of lack of retail activity and as tenants ended their lease contracts, owners of commercial buildings lacked resources to be able to make their development loan payments.
Based on the National Retail Index, a measure of demand and supply across the country, the Jacksonville metro area ranked 43rd in a listing of 44 metro areas according to retail activity.
Nevertheless, despite the slowdown in commercial activity, growth prospects in both the commercial and residential sectors are strong reasons for engaging in Jacksonville foreclosure investing.
In addition, the low prices of foreclosures in Jacksonville make investments in these properties viable. The whopping 50-percent share of foreclosure sales in February was an indication of the popularity of distressed properties to investors and owner-occupant buyers.
Meanwhile, according to real estate professionals, the month-over-month decline in pending house sales in February was caused by the bad weather in the northeast. Pending sales, however, increased by almost 9 percent compared to pending sales in February 2009.
Home sales figures compiled by the realtor association in the Northeast include sales of condominium units and single-family homes in the counties of Clay and Duval and in parts of the counties of Saint Johns and Nassau.
The sharp fall in home prices has been driving Jacksonville foreclosure investing activities. Realtors expect the percentage of foreclosure sales to rise further in the coming weeks.
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