Distressed properties were 30% of Orange County homes listed for sale and 52% of the residences recently put into escrow, according to a new count.

Steve Thomas of ReportsOnHousing.com publishes every two weeks a report on the supply of local homes for sale and the share of that inventory that’s distressed properties — foreclosures and short sales. His latest report — as of March 1 — says …

The distressed inventory experienced its largest drop during this downturn. In Orange County, the active distressed inventory, both short sales and foreclosures combined, is at its lowest point since October 2007. It shed 340 homes in the past two weeks, the most since this downturn began, and now totals 2,187. Thus far in 2012, the distressed inventory has shed 984 homes. That’s 33% in just two months. Currently, the distressed inventory represents 30% of the active inventory. In the past two weeks, the foreclosure inventory dropped by 55 homes and now totals 434, the lowest level since April 2010. Foreclosures are the hottest segment of the current market. Just about every buyer wants to purchase a foreclosure, yet they represent only 6% of the total inventory. The expected market time is 0.9 months, a deep sellers market. The short sale inventory decreased by 285 homes in the past two weeks and now totals 1,753, the lowest level since 2007. The expected market time dropped to 1.3 months, also a deep sellers market.

Some of the details …

• 2,187 distressed Orange County properties were listed for sale — 30% of the 7,189 listed overall.
• 1,848 new escrows were opened to buy distressed Orange County properties in the past 30 days. That is 52% of the 3,553 new pending sales countywide.
• Thomas calculated “market time” — cross of supply and new escrows showing how long, theoretically, it would take to sell inventory. Using that “market time” math, there’s 1.18 months worth of distressed properties on the market vs. 2.93 months worth of non-distressed homes. So, distressed homes currently sell 2.5 times faster than non-distressed homes.
• 22% of the distressed listings were foreclosures being sold by banks; 78% were short sales.
• 47% of the distressed listings were attached homes; 53% were detached homes.
• 28% of distressed Orange County listings were in ocean-close communities.
• Pricey? 65 of the listed distressed homes were price above $1 million — 3% of all distressed listings.
• Cheap? 1,706 of the listed distressed homes were priced $500,000 or less — 78% of all distressed listings.
• Chart summarizes trends in Thomas’ report, distressed counts and share of all listings (plus, pending sales and market time — demand divided by inventory.)

Highlights …

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