Foreclosure Backlog Finally Easing

Since the housing bubble burst in 2008, the recovery in New York and New Jersey has lagged behind other parts of the country. At the beginning of this year, New Jersey and New Jersey had, respectively, the first- and second-highest percentage of homes facing foreclosure.

Today, thanks to speedier courts and relentlessly rising property values, those numbers are coming down sharply, the Wall Street Journal reports. The number of pending foreclosures in New York City dropped by 5.8 percent this year; in New Jersey the decline was an eye-popping 28 percent.

As property values have risen, lenders have started moving forward with foreclosure auctions, making profits from traditionally lower-priced neighborhoods such as Jamaica, Queens. Meanwhile, Justice Lawrence Knipel, the administrative judge for civil cases in Brooklyn’s Supreme Court, has shifted 6,000 stalled foreclosure cases from 20 judges to a single judge, speeding their resolution.

“Who wants to sign foreclosures?” Knipel said. “Not many people. Judges were taking their time.”