Today's Wall Street Journal article "Vermont Mortgage Laws Shut The Door on Bust — and Boom" examines Vermont's low rate of foreclosure and attributes it, in part, to banking regulations and land use practices. The article states, "In July, the state had one home in some stage of foreclosure per 28,300 housing units, according to the research firm RealtyTrac Inc., the lowest among the 50 states." Although locally the headline in today's Burlington Free Press struck a different tone, that article also highlighted Vermont's relatively low foreclosure rate: "Although foreclosures have continued to rise in Vermont, there have been relatively fewer foreclosures here compared with the rest of the United States, according to a Mortgage Bankers Association study. "In the final three months of last year, for example, 3.2 percent of Vermonters with a mortgage were 'seriously delinquent,' compared with 6.3 percent of Americans."
