More than a quarter-million pre-foreclosures and notices of pending foreclosure auctions were filed nationwide in the first quarter of the year, according to data released today by ForeclosureS.com, a real estate advisory service. 253,803 notices of foreclosure were filed in the first quarter of 2007, up 22.5 percent from the 207,128 filings in the fourth quarter of 2006.

As large as those numbers are, they don’t include tens of thousands more now-vacant properties that actually were lost to foreclosure during that same period. Those REO, or bank-owned real estate filings, totaled 110,791 in the first quarter alone — one of the largest influxes of REO recorded in a single quarter in recent history.

“The numbers cast a dark cloud over the American Dream of homeownership,” says Alexis McGee, president of ForeclosureS.com. “Unfortunately for those overextended homeowners it’s a cloud that isn’t likely to lift any time soon either, especially in light of the recent troubles in the sub-prime lending market,” McGee added.
To read the rest of the this, you’ll want to visit this link at Housing Wire.