Once again, Santa Clarita has avoided being part of the Foreclosure Hot List, according to reports for the quarter ending September 30, 2007.

Palmdale and Lancaster continue to top the Los Angeles County foreclosure list, with the number of new Trustee Sales hitting a whopping 727 in only the "hot zones" included in the Top 20 list county-wide for the third quarter of 2007 according to Property Shark.

The average owed per these foreclosure data sources can be misleading, since often this includes only the mortgage being foreclosured upon (most likely the first), while often there are large second mortgages being written off as well.

It seems as though foreclosure has become "no big deal" to many homeowners, who feel that refusing to pay the mortgage and essentially living rent-free for several months is a viable alternative to either selling their homes on the open market or any other financial remedies that may be available to them, including bankruptcy. The "stigma" of having a home foreclosed upon has seemingly gone by the wayside in this crazy real estate market that we find ourselves in.

Property Shark's 3rd quarter 2007 Hot Zone report is below. These are the 20 zip codes in Los Angeles County with the highest number of foreclosures for this time period.

Zip	City	# of Sales	Average $ Owed
93550	Palmdale	186	$255,429
93535	Lancaster	174	$241,143
93551	Palmdale	104	$394,169
91342	Sylmar	104	$351,873
93554	Lancaster	90	$256,124
93552	Palmdale	88	$293,189
93536	Lancaster	85	$322,525
90805	Long Beach	79	$365,642
91331	Pacoima	70	$347,487
90044	Los Angeles	70	$325,596
90003	Los Angeles	64	$359,478
90650	Norwalk	61	$339,693
91344	Granada Hills	61	$476,310
91335	Reseda	57	$393,023
90002	Los Angeles	56	$298,677
91745	Hacienda Heights	53	$453,847
91767	Pomona	52	$335,404
90047	Westmont	50	$347,800
91367	Woodland Hills	49	$568,111
91402	Panorama City	48	$343,777