Phoenix’s foreclosure crisis may finally be over. Arizona State University said the Valley’s foreclosure rate has now hit normal historical levels.
Foreclosures in the Phoenix area are down 53 percent from last year, and Mike Orr with Arizona State University’s W.P. Carey School of Business said that is not the only good news. Home prices are up, reaching $185,000 for single-family dwellings. Orr said it is also likely that foreclosures will actually drop below normal in the future.
“There seems to be a lot of concerns being expressed about investor involvement and interest rates going up, but everything I measure suggests the market is healthy and getting healthier,” Orr said, “not getting worse.”
These are all positive signs for the economy, but Orr insists things are not perfect in the local housing market. Scarcity of available houses is still a big problem. Homebuilders dramatically cut the rate at which they built in the Valley during the recession. Orr said that shortage will probably affect prospective home buyers for years to come.