Scheduled Foreclosures – Where are the continuing problems in L.A.?

Back in January, I did a breakdown by zip code of where the foreclosures were happening – and where they weren’t. At that time, the numbers clearly showed that while many areas of Los Angeles were drowning in foreclosures, the area broadly defined as L.A.’s Westside was not hit as hard with foreclosures as other parts of Los Angeles. Since then, there’s been a number of reports talking about how the Westside has generally weathered the housing market decline better than elsewhere. This is not to say that the Westside has not seen declines. It has. In some areas, the declines have been significant. But overall, the drops in housing prices on the Westside have not been dramatic as elsewhere in Los Angeles.


So where are things going from here?

Well, we know that there are still plenty more mortgage resets coming yet this year. So we’re definitely not out of the woods yet. The nasty subprime resets peak later this year, so we may begin to see some relief later this year. But we also have many loan recasts of those nasty option ARM loans remaining. (Yuck!).

But still, these are likely to be more of a problem in some areas than others. The reason is that in some areas – like the Westside – where housing prices have held most of their ground, where there’s still a relatively low supply, and there’s still decent demand, it will be easier for people to get out of their predicaments by selling. You see, the prices and the foreclosures are symbiotic. So, we still need to look at foreclosures by neighborhood. And even though zip codes are too big of an area to truly be considered one neighborhood, it’s as close as we’ll get from the available data.

So this time I’ve decided to look forward a bit. The following are the numbers of scheduled foreclosure auctions between April 22^nd and May 22^nd for each zip code. The source is propertyshark.com:

SAN FERNANDO VALLEY

• Woodland Hills (91364, 91367) – 13
• Tarzana (91356) – 8
• Encino (91316, 91436) – 7
• North Hollywood (91601) – 5
• Sherman Oaks (91403, 91423) – 4
• Valley Village (91607) – 3
• Studio City (91604, 91602) – 1

LOS ANGELES

• West Hollywood (90046, 90069) – 12
• Echo Park (90026) – 4
• Silver Lake (90039) – 4
• Hollywood Hills (90068) – 2
• Miracle Mile (90036, 90048) -- 3
• Los Feliz (90027) – 1

PLATINUM TRIANGLE

• Beverly Hills (90210, 90211, 90212) – 2
• Brentwood (90049) -- 1
• Bel Air/Holmby Hills – 0

WESTSIDE

• Sawtelle/West L.A. (90025) – 1
• Westwood (90024) – 1
• Cheviot Hills/Rancho Park (90064) – 1
• Pacific Palisades (90272) – 0
• Venice (90291) – 0
• All of Santa Monica (90401, 90402, 90403, 90404, 90405) – 3

See what I mean. It’s not like this is La Puente (42), Inglewood (28), Norwalk (27) or West Covina (20).

Tons of L.A. foreclosures – except on the Westside

The big real estate headline in today’s Los Angeles Times tells of record foreclosures across California – more than twice the biggest quarter in the last housing recession in 1996 – a 421 percent increase over last year. And L.A. County wasn’t spared. Foreclosures in the fourth quarter of 2007 were up 83 percent over the fourth quarter 2006 in our county.

The sky is falling! At least in some places.

But as I like to say, reading the L.A. Times won’t tell you anything about the real estate market in your neighborhood – and that’s especially true for L.A.’s Westside.

Oh yes, there are foreclosures in Los Angeles. Oh yes, housing prices are falling in Los Angeles. The last six months of 2007 were terrible for the L.A. housing market. Just look at some of these foreclosure numbers for certain areas:

FORECLOSURES – June 1-Dec. 31, 2007

• Woodland Hills (91364, 91367) – 100 foreclosures
• Tarzana (91356) – 69 foreclosures
• Encino (91316, 91436) – 54 foreclosures
• Sherman Oaks (91403, 91423) – 43 foreclosures
• Studio City (91604, 91602) – 32 foreclosures
• West Hollywood (90046, 90069) – 27 foreclosures

But then take a look at some of the most desirable areas for those same six months:

• Miracle Mile (90036, 90048) – 7 foreclosures
• Beverly Hills (90210, 90211, 90212) – 3 foreclosures
• Brentwood (90049) – 6 foreclosures
• Bel Air/Holmby Hills (90077) – 11 foreclosures

And now take a look at some other prime Westside areas:

• Sawtelle/West L.A. (90025) – 6 foreclosures
• Westwood (90024) – 11 foreclosures
• Cheviot Hills/Rancho Park (90064) – 3 foreclosures
• Pacific Palisades (90272) – 4 foreclosures
• Venice (90291) – 1 foreclosure
• Santa Monica (90401, 90403, 90404, 90405) – 10 foreclosures
• Santa Monica (90402) – not available (north of Montana where there were likely few)

The point is: Even though foreclosures are hitting California – and Los Angeles County – like crazy, they aren’t hitting the most desirable areas of the Westside.

If you want to look up foreclosures for any zip code in Los Angeles County, you can do so by CLICKING HERE.