Md. Foreclosure Filings Skyrocket In February – Washington Examiner

Prince George’s County saw nearly 1,800 foreclosure filings last month — about one-third of Maryland’s total — as state and federal officials scramble to find a solution to the unrelenting mortgage crisis.

Nine of the 10 Washington-area ZIP codes with the most foreclosure filings in February were in Prince George’s. The county’s filings increased 71 percent from last February, pushing Maryland to the 10th-worst rate in the country, according to the online foreclosure tracking company RealtyTrac.

Just a few years ago, Northern Virginia was ground zero for the foreclosure crisis; Prince William County had more than 6,500 actual foreclosures in 2008, according to data from the county’s assessments office. Over the past 16 months, though, the crisis has shifted from the Virginia suburbs to Maryland.

In November 2008, the 10 ZIP codes with the most foreclosure filings were in Virginia. By November 2009, nine of the top 10 were in Maryland.

The collapse in the housing market hit Virginia harder at first, and now Maryland is lagging, said Andy Bauer, a regional economist at the Baltimore branch of the Richmond Federal Reserve.

Whereas Prince William suffered more from an overbuilding problem, much of the trouble in Prince George’s arose from subprime mortgage lending in established neighborhoods, Bauer said.

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