Monitoring mortgage risk
What's the risk of late mortgage payments in the Baltimore metro area? Higher than in Dallas but lower than in Los Angeles, according to real estate information company First American CoreLogic.
Its latest "mortgage risk monitor" report ranks our metro No. 71 out of 381 markets, with 1 being the highest risk. The Dallas area, by comparison, is ranked 318th and LA comes in at No. 2 (right behind Riverside, Calif.).
The company's ranking of other parts of Maryland include Bethesda-Gaithersburg-Frederick at No. 100, Cumberland in Western Maryland at 109, Hagerstown at 115 and Salisbury at 149. CoreLogic says it bases its risk forecast on "fraud propensity and collateral risk, house price dynamics, and the health of local market economies."
You can find the second-quarter report HERE.
Comments
I'm rather surprise to see the Baltimore area considered riskier than Dallas...
What do you think are the main risks facter causing this?
Posted by: George | May 13, 2008 5:19 PM
Good question -- I can only assume that price must be playing a significant role. Median prices didn't rise nearly as fast in Dallas as they did in the Baltimore metro during the housing boom, so they're more affordable to a wider range of buyers. (There would have been less reason for Dallas buyers to stretch during the boom years with exotic loans, too.)
Posted by: Jamie Smith Hopkins | May 13, 2008 5:25 PM
This is a bit off topic, but the Associated Press is reporting today that, for the first quarter of 2008, Maryland had the HIGHEST sales drop in the nation--38.6%!!!
AP Article
Posted by: Anon | May 13, 2008 6:48 PM
That's right, Anon -- we'll have a story in tomorrow's paper about it. (I was too busy writing it to get a blog post up on the topic, alas.)
Posted by: Jamie Smith Hopkins | May 13, 2008 8:57 PM