Apr. 26--SAN MARCOS -- When the auctioneer takes his place on the north side of the Hays County Courthouse at 1 p.m. on May 5, he'll be offering for sale 124 properties that have been listed for foreclosure.

That number is 29 percent higher than the 96 properties a year ago, according to the Foreclosure Listing Service of Addison.

But that's not the most troubling news in the FLS's monthly report. According to FLS President George Roddy, also on the rise are the numbers of properties that had been listed before.

"The biggest change over the last 30 days in the residential foreclosure market was an increase in the number of foreclosure postings that have been previously posted within the last six months," Roddy said. "One month ago, just 32 percent of the total residential postings were comprised of re-postings. However, the story is far different for the upcoming auction on May 5, with re-postings jumping up to 42 percent of the total residential postings recorded for the month."

Roddy said over the last 30 days, re-postings have jumped from 29 in April to 42 in May, a gain of 45 percent.

"One year ago, for the May 2008 foreclosure auction, just 26 percent of the home postings were re-posts," meaning that over the last year the May re-postings "surged 121 percent, with just 19 residential re-postings recorded for May 2008 compared to the 42 for the upcoming Hays County auction."

Roddy also noted that May will mark the fourth month this year that Hays County postings have topped the 100 mark.

"The 124 postings filed for the upcoming auction ranks as the second highest on record," he said, adding that the record was set in February with 127 postings.

For the year to date, a total of 550 Hays County properties have been listed for foreclosure. "This was 33 percent higher than at this time last year when 414 notices had been recorded," Roddy said. "One year earlier, in 2007, just 366 notices had been filed by this time."

Roddy predicts that foreclosures will "remain on the high side of the market" for the remainder of this year.

"The rising unemployment rate and the expectation of more layoffs to come will fuel the foreclosure crisis for the remainder of this year and keep the foreclosure rate on the high end that we have been experiencing for the last nine months," he said. "Many American families who were already stretching their budgets to the max will be pushed to the brink. As their pocketbooks empty, it is inevitable that more foreclosures will happen."

Roddy said the current crisis is different than in the past, when foreclosures were a "lagging economic indicator."

"This means that changes in leading economic indicators, like employment, triggered a change in foreclosures. But not this time. In fact, this time it was the opposite."

He noted that, "Generally, by the time the property is foreclosed on, the loan is eight to nine months delinquent," though there are extremes at each end. "One posting that I am aware of was two years delinquent, yet another was only six months."

Hays County is still in better shape, foreclosure wise, than neighbors to the north. May listings in Travis county are up 79 percent; while in Williamson the increase was 53 percent.

FLS has been tracking Hays County since late in 2008 and also tracks eight other Central Texas counties.

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