Foreclosure 'crisis' is overblown

The following article is gleaned from "foreclosure 'crisis' is overblown" by Scot Burns of MSN Money.

Sure there are pockets of pain around the US, but it's not as if most Americans are losing their homes. More than 99% of homes aren't in foreclosure.
A recent list of year-end mortgage foreclosure rates in 100 top metropolitan areas drew a lot of attention. Released by Realtytrac, a company that compiles date on home foreclosures, the list showed the number of foreclosure filings in each metro are, the percentage of home being foreclosed and the percentage change from the previous year.
Though the report had some dismal news-- such as the nearly 4.9% foreclosure rate in Stockton, Calif., area-- a close look at the data also provides some reassuring information. The foreclosure crisis is a regional problem, not a systemic one.
Though the national rate of foreclosure increased by a whopping 79% between December 2006 and December 2007, the rate was still only 1.033%. Because about 30% of all homes are owned mortgage free, this means that for all the noise about a crisis, only seven-tenths of 1% of all homes were in foreclosure.
In the top 100 housing markets, the average foreclosure rate was somewhat higher -- 1.38%-- and it was up 78% over the previous year. But if you rank-ordered the list of the top 100 areas, only 34 had foreclosure rates above the group average. Fifty-one areas had rates of 1% or less. Foreclosure rates actually fell in 14 of the 100 areas.
Owning your own home is an idea so popular that it's known as the American dream. But as prices fall and foreclosures rise, for many its become a nightmare instead.
The real economic problem, for most people, isn't the price-spike states. It's the deflation states.