Tuesday, November 20, 2007

Orange County Register - "RealtyTrac must do better" (11-18-07)

"RealtyTrac has now developed a unique way to watch foreclosures. It just doesn't seem to want to use it. The Irvine tracker of foreclosures' original mission was a massive task: a nationwide database of homes in financial distress. This chore requires juggling local filing quirks for the public paperwork that starts, continues and completes a foreclosure. The eye-catching result of RealtyTrac's work are monthly reports on the national foreclosure picture. Previously, the most widely quoted stat was produced from a quarterly survey of mortgage makers by the Mortgage Bankers Association trade group."

Orange County Register - "Tracking the truth on foreclosures" (11-18-07)

"Since RealtyTrac began putting out the news releases in 2005, the number of unique visitors to its Web site has tripled to 3 million a month, said Rick Sharga, RealtyTrac's vice president of marketing. That's hugely important for the company because selling foreclosure listings through its Web site is how RealtyTrac makes money. But questions are being raised about whether the firm's oft-cited numbers overstate the real dimensions of the foreclosure problem. And that could create a problem for the company's credibility."

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