From sddt.com

^[1]The city of San Diego is starting a new initiative to help communities dealing with home foreclosures, San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders announced this week.

Sanders accepted recommendations from the city’s Committee on Foreclosures and Neighborhood Stabilization. These included expanding the city’s vacant properties program to include foreclosed and vacant properties, and making it easier to keep track of who is responsible for the abandoned homes.

The recommendations also called for expanding neighborhood watch programs and creating a new city Web site to provide information and counseling to people losing their homes.

“Far too many San Diego families have watched the dream of home ownership become a nightmare of financial turmoil,” Sanders said at a press conference Tuesday. “My goal in creating the committee was to find ways to prevent and slow the rate of home foreclosures and defaults in our city.”

San Diego County has seen a 133 percent increase in foreclosed homes over the past year, according to the mayor’s office.

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Plus this from the Sacramento Bee:

California 2008

237,131 foreclosures

136,785 loan modifications

http://www.sacbee.com/realestatenews/story/1685519.html ^[2]

“While lenders made interest rate cuts their primary tool, they also temporarily suspended monthly payments and turned toward “short sales” in the second half of 2008. Those are sales in which lenders take less than owed to avoid the higher costs of foreclosing.”

“The data show continued reluctance to offer deeds in lieu of foreclosure, in which a bank simply agrees to take the home back from the borrower. Lenders also avoided lowering the amount borrowers owe. By December, so-called principal reduction was less than 1 percent of workout solutions.”