The number of new foreclosures in New York City shot up in the first quarter of 2008, but not as much as in other large cities.
The number of new foreclosures in the five boroughs increased 51.4 percent in the first quarter of 2008 from the fourth quarter of 2007, according to a new report from research site PropertyShark.com, and 65.7 percent from the first quarter a year earlier.
The number of new foreclosures during the first three months of 2008 totalled 918, with Queens and Staten Island leading the other boroughs with 508 and 174, respectively. Manhattan had the least number of new foreclosures with just 23. Most of the new foreclosures were for single- and two-family homes in outer-borough neighborhoods like Jamaica, Howard Beach, the Rockaways and Woodhaven. (A new foreclosure was defined in the PropertyShark report as a property scheduled for auction for the first time during the quarter.)
Despite the dire increases and all the implications inherent, New York City remained a relative bulwark against the foreclosure wave sweeping much of the United States, especially other larger cities. In Los Angeles County, home of the nation’s second-largest city, new foreclosures were up over 34 percent from the fourth quarter to an astounding 8,887. In Miami-Dade County, where the housing boom burned like wildfire until last year, foreclosures were up quarterly 14.88 percent to 2,231.
In New York City, with its over three million households, the 918 new foreclosures affected 0.030 percent of households. (Take away Queens, which accounted for well over half of the new foreclosures, and the percentage would be much lower.) In L.A. and Miami-Dade, the foreclosures affected over 0.28 percent of households.
Still, the number of new foreclosures in New York City has been trending upward quarterly since 2006, with only a slight dip from the third to the fourth quarter of 2007.
