CHICAGO (Sun-Times Media Wire) -
Illinois had the highest foreclosure rate in the country in August as the number of homes receiving filings jumped 42 percent, compared with a year earlier, according to the latest report from RealtyTrac.
It was the first time Illinois recorded the highest rate since RealtyTrac began issuing its report in January 2005.
Documentation issues, which have been resolved, slowed the foreclosure process here and in other states last year, creating a logjam, and a pickup was expected.
Filings rose 29 percent from July, the report showed.
In judicial states such as Illinois, Florida, New Jersey and New York, where courts have to sign off on foreclosures, "this was a continuation of a trend we've been seeing for several months now," Daren Blomquist, vice president of RealtyTrac, said in a statement. "The increases in Florida and Illinois pushed foreclosure rates in those states to the two highest in the country —supplanting non-judicial states of Arizona, California, Georgia and Nevada."
Prior to August, the top two state foreclosure rates have been from those four non-judicial states every month since December 2010, Blomquist said.
Last month, one in every 298 homes in Illinois received a filing, or 17,781 Illinois homes.
Foreclosure starts rose 18 percent year-over-year in Illinois, and bank repossessions jumped 41 percent.
In the Chicago metropolitan area, filings rose 44 percent from August 2011 and 28 percent from July.
Nationally, the number of homes receiving filings fell 15 percent from August to 193,508 homes. That was an increase of 1 percent from July.
Foreclosure activity in the 24 non-judicial states and the District of Columbia decreased 31 percent annually, but 15 posted monthly increases.
Twenty states had year-over-year increases in foreclosure activity, led by judicial foreclosure states, including New Jersey, New York, Maryland and Pennsylvania.
