Real Estate Real Estate Sales - South Walton, FL

Is Forbes Really Correct About Rosemary Beach Foreclosures?

November 30, 2011 murraybalkcom

Recently, Forbes.com published the following information regarding Rosemary Beach foreclosures. I’m sure that people read it without question and believe it because Forbes is highly regarded in the business world. In the article, Forbes reports conflicting information, noting in one place that 10 out of 104 properties with active loans are in default in Rosemary Beach, and in the other place that Rosemary Beach has ten foreclosures and 268 properties with existing loans. It appears for their ranking, Forbes used the 10 out of 104, or maybe something close to it, since 10 out of 104 is really 9.6% instead of the 9.9% which they report. Maybe they were just antsy to post their list making things sound so bad.

Rosemary Beach has about 573 properties to the best of my knowledge which could potentially have a loan. This means that using either 104 or 268 existing loans, whichever of Forbes’ numbers you want to believe, Rosemary Beach has either 81.8% or 53.2% of their total properties paid for in full by property owners. And, if you believe Forbes’ reported number of foreclosures as being ten, that would mean that 98.2% of the properties in Rosemary Beach have not been foreclosed upon. But where’s the story in that? Maybe Forbes should run an article ranking by the percentage of properties paid for in full (without loans) from their list of wealthiest zip codes.

From Forbes.com (full article)

…Where It’s Worst
The result? Perhaps not surprisingly, hard-hit Florida led our list. It has two higher end hoods in top spots: Fisher Island (No. 1) and Rosemary Beach (No. 3). Fisher Island, the Miami Beach multimillionaire enclave and the 43rd most expensive ZIP code in the country, has a whopping 20.5% foreclosure rate, with 38 out of 184 active loans in default. Rosemary Beach, a posh planned community in the panhandle and the 69th most expensive ZIP code, clocks in at 9.9%, with 10 out of 104 homes in default.

Record numbers of foreclosures have translated into price depreciations of 50% or more in many parts of the state, pushing yet more underwater homeowners into foreclosure. “The rates in Florida have been among the highest for a very long time now so I think it’s emblematic of that,” says Herb Blecher, vice president of LPS Applied Analytics….