California home foreclosures up in April, but default notices down

By Sue McAllister, The Mercury News

In a switch from the previous month, the number of California foreclosures increased in April, while fewer homeowners received notices of default from their lenders.

A report Tuesday from ForeclosureRadar said there were 13,550 foreclosures in the state in April, up 35 percent from March. In March, foreclosures had slowed by 41 percent compared to February.

Sean O'Toole, founder of ForeclosureRadar, which is based in Discovery Bay and reports solely on California foreclosures, said the increase in foreclosures is because of the lifting of many lenders' moratoria on home repossessions, which were in place at the end of 2008 and lifted in March after the announcement of the Obama administration's foreclosure-prevention programs.

Meanwhile, notices of default fell 18 percent from March, to 42,675 new filings statewide in April. The notices are the first step in the foreclosure process, typically sent by lenders to borrowers who are a few months behind in their mortgage payments. In March, such notices shot to a record-high level of more than 54,000 filings.

Santa Clara County followed the statewide trend, with foreclosures increasing to 294 in April, up 19 percent from March. The peak month for foreclosures in the county was August 2008, when 853 foreclosures took place.

A total of 1,352 default notices were filed in the county last month, down 13 percent from a peak of 1,556 in March.

In San Mateo County, there were 89 foreclosures

last month, up 13 percent from March. Alameda County had 349 foreclosures, up 6 percent. In Contra Costa County, foreclosures rose 36 percent from March, to 552.