The Jersey City Independent "

The number of foreclosure filings in Hudson County jumped by 45 percent in March from the previous month, according to the website RealtyTrac. The county numbers mirror a national trend that experts say is the result of a de facto moratorium on foreclosures earlier in the year.

“Since much of this activity was in new foreclosure actions, it suggests that many lenders and servicers were holding off on executing foreclosures due to industry moratoria and legislative delays,” RealtyTrac CEO James J. Saccacio says.

The increase here in Hudson County was much more pronounced than the 17 percent nationwide increase in foreclosure filings — default notices, auction sale notices and bank repossessions — from February to March.

Quarterly data also released today show a more nuanced picture for the county, with fewer foreclosure filings than last fall but many more than this time last year.

Hudson County saw a 23.1 percent decrease in foreclosure filings from the last quarter of 2008 to the first of 2009, but year over year, foreclosure filings are up by 65.3 percent. That’s more than double the increase in the national figure of 24 percent.

A total of 691 properties — one out of every 369 housing units — in Hudson County faced foreclosure filings in the first quarter of this year.

Jorge Aviles, general counsel of the Hudson County Housing Resource Center and a former Jersey City councilman, isn’t surprised by the new stats.

“Hudson County might have been targeted by the subprime mortgage market,” he says, noting that his office is as busy as ever with people fighting to stave off foreclosure.

“We have not seen a downtick in the number of people coming in,” Aviles says. “We’re seeing a steady stream continuing to come in.”

New Jersey as a whole bucked nationwide foreclosure trends from quarter to quarter, an aberration some advocates attribute to new programs instituted by the Corzine administration.

Nationwide foreclosure filings increased nearly 24 percent in the first quarter of 2009 from the same time period last year, but the number in New Jersey was down 10.65 percent. In addition, filings were up 9 percent from the 4th quarter of 2008 nationwide, but over the same time period, they were down nearly 30 percent in New Jersey.

Citizen Action executive director Phyllis Salowe-Kaye says that while she’s heartened by the statewide numbers, her nonprofit is still taking in up to 100 new clients each week.

“The numbers are meaningless to us because we’re seeing huge client number increases,” she says, and her anecdotal evidence is supported by the data, which show a 39 percent jump in foreclosure filings from February to March, even as total filings over the first three months was down from last year.

“The state is doing a lot of publicity on its new programs,” she says, which has likely contributed to more people seeking assistance even while the number of foreclosure filings might be decreasing. “People now know where to go for help.”

While cautioning homeowners not to think that the new state and federal programs will be able to solve all their housing problems, Salowe-Kaye still thinks progress is being made.

“We’ve got a lot of tools in our toolchest right now thanks to President Obama and Governor Corzine,” she says.

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