28.4 percent of homeowners now ‘underwater’

Zillow, the Seattle-based online real estate marketplace, announced it has pushed back its forecast for the “bottom” of the housing market from late 2011 to 2012 “at the earliest.”

The company’s first-quarter report revealed that a record-high 28.4 percent of all single-family homes with mortgages were “underwater,” meaning owners owed more than the market value of their homes.

Also a record was the number of homes in one month that sold at a loss – 37.7 percent in March. The rate of homes selling for a loss has steadily increased since June 2010, Zillow found.

According to Zillow’s first quarter Real Estate Market Reports, median home values, as measured by the Zillow Home Value Index, fell 3 percent during the first three months of the year.