Florida's foreclosure rates led the nation in February for the sixth consecutive month.
And the Bay area was among the communities hit hard.
According to Bay News 9's partner newspaper the Bradenton Herald, the Bay area was the fourth-highest for foreclosures in the country. And the Manatee-Sarasota area jumped to 13th.
RealtyTrac, which tracks foreclosures and other real estate data, shows February foreclosure filings -- default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions -- on 154,281 properties across the nation. U.S. foreclosure starts increased 10 percent from the previous month after three consecutive monthly decreases, but were still down 25 percent from February 2012.
Florida cities accounted for seven of the nation's 10 highest metro foreclosure rates in February, with Miami, Orlando, Ocala, Tampa and Palm Bay metro areas in the top five spots.
As individual counties, Manatee had a 17.2 percent monthly foreclosure increase over January, and a 27.4 percent increase over a year ago, while Sarasota reported a 7 percent monthly decrease, but a 31.7 spike in foreclosures since February 2012.
In all, a total of 1,062 area homes were in foreclosure last month, of which 543 were in Manatee, representing one out of 317 homes. In Sarasota, 519 houses, or one of every 439, were in foreclosure.