OCEANSIDE - Frank Jones packed his Mustang GT to the brim. His wife, Courtney, swept the two-bedroom condominium as the couple and their three kids left home - forced out by a foreclosure crisis that has overwhelmed their neighborhood more than any other in the county.

"If it weren't for family and friends, right now we'd be homeless," Jones said, standing in the doorway of his former home recently, scratching his three-day beard.

Last year, one out of every 17 homes in Oceanside's 92057 ZIP code entered foreclosure in this northeast corner of the city, according to data from RealtyTrac, a foreclosure tracking service, and the San Diego Association of Governments. Those numbers do not include December foreclosures.

The resulting effects, shown in a North County Times analysis of foreclosure and sale listing data, in that ZIP code illustrate the pandemic nature of the county's, and the nation's, housing crisis:

- For every nonforeclosed home for sale, there are about four to five homes in, or in serious danger of, foreclosure.

- Half of the area's 36 December home sales were foreclosures.

- Just less than half of the month's sales, 44 percent, sold for more than 10 percent below the original listing price. One home sold for 37 percent lower than the original listing, a $142,400 freefall.

- Of homes for sale in the beginning of January, 65 percent of 362 listings are either in some stage of foreclosure or on sale for less than the previous sale price or total loan amount.

"I think there's more people that have lost their homes than actually still live here," said Courtney Jones.

Many of the foreclosed families here said they were sent into foreclosure when their subprime loans graduated from the initial "teaser" rate - a low interest rate generally offered for only the first two or three years of a 30-year mortgage - to a higher adjustable interest rate.

But 30 miles northeast and across the Riverside County line, it is clear the spike in regional foreclosures knows no credit score. There, the city of Murrieta saw one of every nine homes enter foreclosure last year.

While Oceanside's troubles are clustered in neighborhoods where night turns cracked streets pitch-black save for the yellow glow of sparse streetlights, the ZIP code's high foreclosure rate also includes distressed homes one mile east in neighborhoods landscaped with ambient lighting and horse-walking trails, creating an urbanized ranch effect.

Effects overwhelming

Just as the real estate market is hyper-local - homes on the same block with the same size can vary in price by 15 percent - so are the foreclosures that have overwhelmed the market.

Each foreclosure tells a different story with varying causes:

- Frank Jones, a self-employed heating and air conditioning repairman, inherited a 837-square-foot condominium when his mother died. Saddled with other real estate properties left by his mother, the Joneses said they could not sell the homes for enough to pay off the loans and keep up with mortgage payments.

- Fong Noimanivone in Murrieta is struggling to make monthly mortgage payments after four investment homes in Arizona went bad. She said she cannot sell without bank approval because she bought at the market's peak and now owes more on the Murrieta home than its value.

- Catalino Quintanar said he could not afford his mortgage after a two-year fixed rate expired and was adjusted to a higher interest rate, sending him into default on his four-bedroom home.

A common cause links many foreclosures: The decline in prices and lack of buyers prevents distressed homeowners from selling property before they become delinquent on their mortgages.

"We couldn't rent it, because we wouldn't break even. We can't sell it because everything's been selling for less," Courtney Jones said.

The deluge of foreclosed homes has dictated market prices, creating an effect on sellers who are not struggling to make payments, real estate agents said.

"In one word: terrible," said Barbara Baker, a real estate agent in Murrieta. "It makes it impossible for someone with a job offer elsewhere to get fair market value. It's awful. I've been here since 1980 and I haven't seen it this bad."

Disquieting silence

Prevalent as well are intangible changes, especially in the south end of Arthur Avenue in Oceanside, where Quintanar lives. Of 28 homes here, at least nine entered foreclosure last year, according to foreclosure data from ForeclosureRadar, a statewide tracking service, and Sandicor, San Diego County's real estate listing service.

The street's foreclosures have caused many homeowners to say the neighborhood feels quiet.

Arthur Avenue has not turned into a ghost town yet - boys still tossed a football in the street and girls played house in Quintanar's front yard last week - but many of the families here could be gone within the next few months.

Quintanar's home houses two families and six children who will be forced out soon, he said. Quintanar, a spa repairman, defaulted on his loan in October.

"The bank wants to work with us, but the interest rates are still too high," Quintanar said in Spanish. "Now I can only rent because it's just so difficult."

Other than changing the general feel of the neighborhood, the high rate of foreclosures has caused a dramatic drop in sales prices on this street. In May of last year, a bank-owned home sold for $415,000; in December, another foreclosure just across the street, a slightly smaller home, sold for $282,000.

Foreclosures are also altering the aesthetics of the neighborhood. Bank-owned properties are home to brown lawns and drying plants. At one foreclosed house, a mattress lying on top of a shattered full-length mirror sat in the driveway while cigarette butts and rotting oranges littered the dead lawn.

Forces come together

While some of the effects of the financing crunch are visual, the causes are less so. But the confluence of some can be seen in the case of Oceanside's Ben Leau: a borrower who did not understand what he was signing, a lender eager to make the biggest loan possible and a borrower eager to draw cash from his home's equity.

Leau said he bought his home in 2000 for $283,000. He secured a loan with a two-year teaser interest rate.

Before the rate increase, he got another two-year teaser. After two more years, he refinanced again and again until he refinanced for the fourth time in 2005 for $414,000.

Leau said he put no money down on his home, paid no closing costs and estimates he has netted about $50,000 in cash from refinancing. He used the money to pay off $8,000 in debt and fund a vacation to Hawaii.

He said he can't remember which lender he most recently refinanced with, only that it was one from a slew of mailings.

"I called up and said, 'I want to refinance.' (The loan officer) said, 'How much do you want?' I said 'I want $30,000.' He said, 'Do you want more?' " Leau said.

He said he is not worried about the pending auction of his home and that he was excited about the possibility of renting a bigger, nicer house. Leau's five children and three grandchildren share the three-bedroom, 1,071-square-foot house.

Stretching finances

Unlike Leau, Fong Noimanivone in Murrieta is fighting off the foreclosure process and said she has not been affected by interest rate increases. She is stretching her monthly budget to make payments on her 30-year fixed interest rate mortgage because of her tenants' failure to pay rent on investment homes she owned and has since lost to foreclosure and short sales in Arizona.

"We have to cut down a lot on everything, on groceries, on gas," Noimanivone said. "We can't go anywhere except to work and home, that's it."

She said that since she bought her home two years ago for $680,000 and homes in the area currently sell for $420,000, she now owes more than the home could be sold for, forcing her to look at a short sale.

Distressed borrowers can sell their homes for less than the loan amount if the bank agrees. Theoretically, both sides win in a short sale: Borrowers take less of a ding on their credit ratings and banks lose less money than going through a lengthy foreclosure.

But banks do not always agree to short sales, said Kurt Kinsey, a real estate agent in Oceanside who has seen a bank sell a home for less than a short sale offer it previously refused.

"The bank could've got more money for it," he said. "Why didn't they? I don't know, there must be something I'm missing."

Noimanivone is in trouble, in part, she said, because of 100 percent financing - where the amount of the mortgage equals the home's value. The loans were used to help first-time buyers, who might not have the cash reserves for a down payment.

ì(Homeowners) were overencumbered to begin with, with these zero-down loans,î Baker said. ìAnd when the values dropped, not only do you have zero equity, you're at the very bottom of the totem pole.î

The riskier loans played a part in the majority of foreclosures for sale in Oceanside's 92057 ZIP code. About 55 percent were purchased with less than 5 percent down while 35 percent had down payments that could not be determined because of repeated refinancing, according to Sandicor, the county's home listing service.

Struggle to recover

Oceanside's neighborhoods with the highest foreclosure rates will struggle to recover more than Murrieta will, real estate agents said.

Not only do neighborhoods like those near Camp Pendleton's back gate, where Quintanar and Leau live, have to wait for foreclosures to slow, real estate agents said parts of Oceanside's 92057 ZIP code have had to shake off a stigma of being a violent, dangerous place to live.

About a year before foreclosures hit one out of three homes on the south end of Arthur Avenue, Oceanside police Officer Dan Bessant was shot and killed there. Three teenagers from the neighborhood are awaiting trial in connection with his death.

"That's a hard place to sell a house right now, regardless of the market," Kinsey said.

The bank-owned properties blamed for the disquieting quiet will increase, foreclosure trackers say, because the number of defaults - the first step in foreclosure - have steadily increased.

If the analysts are right, there will be plenty more families like the Joneses, who still don't know where they will settle.

"I don't know," Frank Jones said, letting out an exasperated sigh while his wife, Courtney, packed up their belongings. "I really don't know."

Contact staff writer Zach Fox at (760) 740-5412 or zfox@nctimes.com.

Fast Facts

- Notice of default: A public notice that a homeowner has missed mortgage payments on a loan secured by the home.

- Notice of sale: Document that announces the public auction of a property, sometimes occurring a year after the initial default.

- REO: Stands for real estate owned and indicates a property that the bank has repossessed after the loan default. The bank will often buy the home at auction if there are no bids higher than the loan amount and then sell the home through a real estate agent.

- Short sale: A sale by a homeowner unable to make mortgage payments, with the sales price being less than the loan amount. The sale is made through a real estate agent and is subject to approval by the bank.

Sources: ForeclosureRadar, RealtyTrac