The FINANCIAL — Distressed properties are currently accounting for ten percent of all sales, down 33 percent from April 2014, when 15 percent of home sales were distressed properties. Any investors looking for good properties to turn around now must look harder.
A new report from RealtyTrac will help. It shows where the distressed markets remain strongest. The survey ranks the top 20 Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) by the amount of their current distressed discounts and shows month-over-month and year-over-year percentage changes from February 2014 to February 2015.
Leading the list is the MSA of Allentown and Bethlehem, Pennsylvania that also includes Easton, New Jersey. It has a distressed discount of 66 percent. The population of more than 823,000, with 342,000 total properties, has seen its distressed sales median price drop from $68,000 in February 2014 to just under $47,000 in February 2015, a year-over-year decline of 31 percent.
Rounding out the top five MSAs, in order, are Toledo, Ohio (62 percent decline), Cleveland-Elyria-Mentor, Ohio (61 percent decline), Detroit-Warren-Livonia, Michigan (60 percent decline), and the MSA that includes Memphis, Tennessee and parts of Mississippi and Arkansas (57 percent decline).
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