By now, most people have heard that Real Estate prices are starting to tick upwards and that the Real Estate Market is improving. Distressed properties, while still an issue, have concurrently become less of a factor in the market.

Realty Trac, an online tracker of foreclosure filings in the United States, recently released its U.S. Foreclosure Market Report for October 2012. Nationwide, foreclosure filings were down 19 percent from last year, and actual repossessions, or completed foreclosures, were down 21 percent from last year. Nationwide, completed foreclosures have now been decreasing for 24 straight months and are at their lowest level since July of 2007.

Some states are still seeing large amounts of foreclosures, but the methods of getting those foreclosures off the books are not always agreed upon. As reported by the NAR ®, the California Association of Realtors ® is objecting to the bulk sale of 970 foreclosed homes from Fannie Mae to a single investment firm. The investment firm Colony Capital had the winning bid of $176 million for the bundle of homes. CAR argues that low inventory levels and increasing buyer demand makes such bulk sales unnecessary. They argue Fannie Mae should make the foreclosed properties available for purchase by first time homebuyers and owner occupants before offering them in bulk to investors that will hold them and rent them until prices appreciate.

In Bozeman, the number of distressed properties in the market continues to decrease. Year to date, foreclosures and short sales have made up approximately 12% of all single family homes sold in Bozeman in 2012. During the same time period last year, they constituted nearly 20%.

As usual, I have included data for the number of homes sold during the first 10 months of 2012. In addition to the 616 homes sold during this time period, another 110 homes are currently pending, or under contract, as of the date of writing this article.

The included data reflects sales of homes on both less than and more than one acre in the greater Bozeman area, including Four Corners, Gallatin Gateway, Bridger Canyon, and Bozeman city limits. The data includes home sales reported through the local Southwest Montana MLS, and does not include private party sales, Condominiums, or Townhouses.

Tim Ford is a Realtor ® with Vellinga Real Estate in Bozeman Montana. He can be contacted at 406-209-1214.