The property at 4-6 Newbury St., which includes a 160-car garage and first-floor retail space across from the Taj Boston Hotel, faces foreclosure, because its owner defaulted on the mortgage, according to a legal notice published yesterday.

The building is owned by Newbury Garage Associates LLC, which state corporation papers indicate is headed by Nader Golestaneh. Golestaneh, president of Boston’s Centremark Properties Inc., did not return calls for comment.

Jack Polatin, a Boston attorney representing the property’s mortgage holder, declined comment yesterday.

In April 2008, Golestaneh won Boston Redevelopment Authority approval to redevelop 4-6 Newbury in what would have been the first new major retail and office building on the upscale shopping thoroughfare. The estimated $14 million project never proceeded, however.

Golestaneh planned to tear down the 1980s-era, 49,000-square-foot garage and replace it with a seven-story building with three floors of retail space topped with four floors dedicated to offices, and 15 underground parking spaces.

“It’s a phenomenal retail location, and I think that a long list of retailers would love to be on the first block of Newbury Street – recession or no recession,” said Andy LaGrega, a partner at Wilder Cos., a retail development firm in Boston. “Prime properties, especially on Newbury Street, always are sought after.”

Retail rents for the property would fetch well over $100 per square foot and probably approach $200 per square foot for the first floor, LaGrega said.

Goodman, who took part in a panel discussion on the real estate market I moderated last week at the InterContinental Hotel in Boston, contends one in five homes is either in foreclosure or facing potential foreclosure trouble down the line.

That’s a whopping 11.6 million homes, or about 20 percent of the market, she told members of the Boston Security Analysts Society, which hosted the discussion.

It’s a number that arguably provides a more comprehensive picture than the conventional default rate – 13.5 percent according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.

And it clashes with conventional thinking in a banking industry bracing for another 4 million foreclosures, not double or triple that number. Here’s a link to a recent report by Goodman and Amherst that lays out the numbers.

Goodman’s forecast takes into account a high rate of re-default among struggling homeowners taking part in various, government-sponsored mortgage modification programs.

Goodman’s breakdown goes roughly like this. Twenty of every 100 loans are “impaired.” Of these, nine are seriously behind on their payments. Another six are now “Dirty Current” – in various government modification programs whose graduates have been defaulting at a rate of 50 percent a year. The final five are underwater on their mortgages by more than 20 percent – a group that has been defaulting at a rate of 20 percent a year.

It is a crisis that is more staggering that most of us realize – and is likely to have a much more dramatic impact on both federal policy and the banking industry than many are bargaining for right now.

Goodman predicts Uncle Sam will eventually have to embrace mortgage write-downs – letting 11 million-plus homes slide into foreclosure will prove politically untenable to policymakers and politicians in Washington.

“You have 11.6 million units in jeopardy,” Goodman said. “That is one borrower out of every five. You can’t foreclose on one borrower in five.”

“Politically this cannot happen. Successive mortgage modification programs will be attempted until something works,” she notes in a recent report.

Meanwhile, the banking industry could take a huge hit as well.

Nouriel Roubini, the economist who predicted the financial crisis and who has been dubbed “Dr. Doom” by the press, has looked at Goodman’s numbers and is warning of serious problems ahead for banks.

He pegs the potential damage at a cool trillion.

Ouch!

While the 557 completed foreclosures statewide last month was down 39 percent from the 914 foreclosures in October last year, a total of 11,334 foreclosure deeds have been completed this year, up 47 percent from the same period last year. 

In Melrose, there were two completed foreclosures last month, one more than in October 2009, but the more significant increase is the 24 completed foreclosures in Melrose so far this year, compared to nine in the same period last year. That’s a 166 percent increase.

Completed foreclosures statewide already outnumber the amount recorded in the Bay State in 2009 and could outpace the record number in 2008. There were 12,430 and 9,269 foreclosure deeds in all of 2008 and 2009, respectively.

In a press release, Timothy M. Warren Jr., CEO of The Warren Group, said that recent decreases in foreclosures compared to last year are “welcoming,” but that the state “should not be fooled into thinking” that foreclosure problems are a thing of the past.

“Due to job and economic conditions, many homeowners are delinquent on their mortgages and those problems will eventually find their way into foreclosure statistics,” Warren said.

Foreclosure petitions in Massachusetts, the first step in the foreclosure process, dropped statewide to 1,127 in October, a near 51 percent decrease from 2,296 in October 2009. Melrose saw a similar percentage drop in foreclosure petitions, from seven in October 2009 to three last month, a 57 percent drop.

So far this year in Massachusetts, a total of 22,091 foreclosure petitions have been filed, compared to 23,931 for the same period last year. In Melrose, lenders have initiated 50 foreclosure processes so far this year, just about a 4 percent decline from the 50 foreclosure petitions filed in 2009 year-to-date.

However, Warren said that recent temporary freezes in foreclosure filings by banks may be the cause for the decline.

“It’s possible that this decline in foreclosure starts was influenced by the example set by Bank of America when they temporarily suspended foreclosure activity,” he said. “Lenders may have waited to file petitions while rechecking their procedures and paperwork. As a result, we are likely to see a decrease over the next few months because of these delays.”

October marked the highest number of auction announcements tracked by The Warren Group so far this year. Auction announcements jumped more than 26 percent to 3,292 from 2,603 in October 2009 and were also 43 percent higher than the 2,301 auction announcements tracked in September.

The real estate firm said it has bought the John Hancock Tower for $930 million after a fierce bidding war over the signature tower. Boston Properties already owns the neighboring Prudential building.

The deal further strengthens the firm’s hold on the Back Bay office market, where it also owns towers at 101 and 111 Huntington Ave. In the battle for the Hancock, Boston Properties beat out former owner Beacon Capital Partners of Boston, Vornado Realty Trust of New York, and Fortis Properties, also of New York, among others.

The Hancock is by far the most valuable building to change hands in Boston this year, where the sales market is coming alive after extremely sluggish activity during the recession.

“The bidding was as fierce as anything I’ve ever handled during my 30 years in this business,” said Robert Griffin, who brokered the sale for Cushman & Wakefield, a real estate services firm.

Boston Properties said it would pay $289.5 million in cash and assuming $640.5 million in debt.

Although the transaction was initially marketed as a partial sale, Boston Properties is buying 100 percent ownership of the tower. The seller, Normandy Real Estate Partners, will retain management responsibilities for the next two years, as it completes renovations of the lobby and construction of an underground parking garage.

A team of Normandy and Five Mile Capital Partners bought the Hancock for $660 milllion at a foreclosure auction in 2009 after prior owner Broadway Partners missed several debt payments. Normandy has attracted several new tenants to the building, including investment powerhouse Bain Capital, which agreed to lease seven floors earlier this year. That lease increased the tower’s occupancy to more than 95 percent, putting Normandy in a better position to sell.

The 62-story Hancock Tower is one of the most notable buildings in Boston. The office building has roughly 1.7 million square feet of rentable space.

In fact, half of the units at Greenway Place, a newly renovated 12-unit, eight-story historic building, have gone into foreclosure, at least briefly, over the past two years. Such troubles are unusual in Boston’s downtown market, which has largely been cushioned from the rash of foreclosures that have plagued Massachusetts since home prices starting falling in 2005.

This year, however, foreclosure activity for downtown condos has started to edge upward. Petitions, the first step in the process of a lender taking back a property, have swelled to 46 for during the first five months of the year, compared with 30 during the same period last year, according to Warren Group, a Boston company that tracks real estate data. Petitions have been attached to some of the city’s most deluxe addresses over the past year, including the Residences at the Ritz-Carlton Towers and the Residences at the Intercontinental, according to the Suffolk County Registry of Deeds.

Completed foreclosures occur less frequently but also have increased slightly. Downtown condo owners lost eight properties to foreclosure during the first five months of 2010, compared with six during the same period last year, according to Warren Group. In May, a buyer purchased a foreclosed unit in Folio Boston, a luxury condo complex, for $650,000 — about $275,000 less than it sold for in 2006. Another unit in the Greenway Place was taken back by a lender this month and quickly resold for $699,000.

Whether these foreclosures represent a blip in time or a sign of what’s to come is up to debate, local real estate professionals say.

Kevin Ahearn, president of the Boston marketing and brokerage company Otis & Ahearn, said a bump up in the number of foreclosure petitions on high-end condos is the result of financial troubles among wealthy homeowners that likely will soon ebb because investment portfolios have stabilized. He said sales and prices in the high-end market are on the increase this year.

“It is a delayed reaction,’’ Ahearn said. “You are on an upswing now.’’

Debra Taylor Blair, president of Listing Information Network, a Boston company that tracks downtown real estate, said troubles at Greenway Place are unique to the building — it’s a boutique building on the fringe of the financial district that offers no parking or concierge services. “Fundamentally, I feel the downtown condo market is on rock solid footing,’’ Taylor Blair said.

Other market watchers are not so sure. Jon Gollinger, East Coast chief executive of Accelerated Marketing Partners, a Boston company that runs auctions for high-end buildings nationwide, said Boston’s downtown likely will see more foreclosures as wealthy people struggle with job loss and declining home values.

“It’s inevitable,’’ he said.

Greenway Place, located at 199 State St., across from the Marriott Long Wharf, appears to have had more than its share of troubles. The building was touted by developers in 2005 as a “hidden jewel’’ once overshadowed by the Central Artery. When the thoroughfare was dismantled as part of the Big Dig, the building was converted from office space into deluxe residential units with lofty price tags ranging from $1.3 million to $2.9 million.

But the building’s launch in 2005 coincided with the start of the state’s housing market downfall. Developer Richard Tambone was unable to sell five of the 12 units, and they eventually fell into foreclosure. Several owners stopped paying their condo fees, and lawsuits mounted.

Under financial pressure, Tambone sold three units at auction in 2008 and another in June for $640,000 in a short sale, a process in which the lender agrees to a price less than the mortgage balance. Tambone’s last remaining unit, with an original price tag of $1.8 million, was foreclosed upon by Bank of America Corp. this month and sold days later to a new owner for $699,000, public records show.

Tambone, president of Tambone Investment Group in Burlington, said he was a victim of bad timing as condo values in the area fell precipitously. Despite the problems, he said, he is still “very proud’’ of the building and continues to tout the project on his company’s website. He maintains that unlike some developers who abandoned struggling projects in recent years, he has worked with lenders to sell the remaining units. He said the lawsuits, including one from a lender and another from disgruntled investors, have been settled.

“So many other developers walked away,’’ Tambone said. “You can’t control the economy.’’

Christos Christoudias, a Greenway Place condo trustee, is optimistic about the future of the building, which is surrounded by good restaurants and is within walking distance to the harbor. Christoudias said he bought his unit in 2007 for 25 percent less than the initial asking price. When he moved in, fees were too high and many owners were delinquent in making payments, Christoudias said. The association eliminated the concierge, reduced monthly dues, and started collection procedures against owners who weren’t paying.

“It’s finally all figured out,’’ he said. “Now we have a surplus of condo fees.’’

But another owner, investor Ryan Connelly, is probably not so upbeat about the building. Connelly bought the second-floor unit at a foreclosure auction in 2008 for $901,000, according to the unit deed. Even after making major improvements, including the golden flooring, he has yet to find a buyer, according to listing broker Herion Karbunara. In May, the unit fell back into foreclosure and is now listed for $1.4 million — $1.2 million less than it was marketed for in 2008.

Connelly did not respond to requests for an interview, but Karbunara said the lowered price “breaks his heart.’’

“Once a building gets a bad rap, it’s very hard to clean it up, especially if it’s small,’’ he said. “I feel good about the building. I feel like it turned around.’’

“We’re marketing these properties locally, regionally and nationally to alert interested parties of the sales scheduled to start on June 21^st and run through the 29^th,” says Thomas Saturley, President of Tranzon Auction Properties. “We’re very pleased to be offering these properties, I spent quite a few professional years in the gasoline trades, so station sales are near and dear to my heart.”

Brecht Palombo, of Tranzon Auction Properties’ Massachusetts office, notes that the sales offer a unique opportunity for entrepreneurial buyers to get started in the gasoline business, or for established players to add to their existing portfolio of locations. “The calls started the minute we put these up on the website,” says Palombo. “Folks had been looking at these stores since they shut down earlier this year. Acquiring these at auction provides a solid opportunity to purchase at a fair price, and buyers are interested.”

For a complete list of properties, please visit www.cstoreauction.com

Got Space? Got Land? Got Privacy? You will if you move here! Fantastic North Middleboro location. This house has it all. Perfect for extended family living. Farmers Porch, Master bath features Steam Bath and Jacuzzi Tub. Huge bonus room over garage w/reinforced beams will keep everyone entertained. 2 central air units, huge inviting foyer, beautiful cabinets in kitchen, wrap around porch, 4 bedrooms, and 3 full baths. Lots of frontage. Lots of privacy. Not your typical cookie cutter postage lot.

The status of the 120-acre parcel has been uncertain since late 2009, when bankers foreclosed on plans to build The Commons at Prospect Hill, an ambitious development of offices, shops, and restaurants, on the site.

Yesterday, Park said he’s planning a more modest mixed-use office and retail development for the site, with about a third less density than was planned by the previous developer. Specifically, Park said he would like to see a corporate headquarters, a department store, and a mix of national and local retailers.

Park said he bought the property because of its “prominence on 128, in the epicenter of technology outside Boston,’’ adding that he thinks “real estate prices have reached rock bottom, and we’re poised for an upturn.’’

Mayor Jeannette McCarthy of Waltham said she’s pleased with the new buyer, adding this is a great opportunity to deal with major traffic issues because Park has traffic design experience. “I’m happy with the fact that [Park] understands first-hand the problems,’’ said McCarthy.

The property was sold by German bank Helaba and PB Capital, which seized it in October, after bidding $42.5 million for the 120-acre site at a foreclosure auction.

Park & Co. also has been planning a development across Route 128 from the Polaroid site for more than eight years, but yesterday Park said he plans to develop the Polaroid property first.

“My hope is that we will be able to develop a traffic plan for the Polaroid site that will work with the development we’ve been working on across 128,’’ he said.

Park said he was planning “a phased development,’’ and was eager to get the project going.

“I’d like to get something started this summer,’’ he said.

But there is a flurry of signs, some national, and one local, that we just might be finally reaching a turning point.

On the macro level, the number of homeowners falling behind on their mortgages actually fell in the fourth quarter, the Mortgage Bankers Association reported Friday.

Mortgages either 30 or 60 days past due fell in the fourth quarter compared to both the third quarter of 2009 and the last three months of 2008 as well.

Meanwhile, a few government officials appear to be finally getting the idea the time is past for fancy sounding initiatives with big numbers that, when push comes to shove, just don’t work.

The Obama Administration is sending $1.5 billion to five states hardest hit by the foreclosure crisis, namely Nevada, California, Florida, Arizona and Michigan. The money will be used to do everything from bail out underwater homeowners to help the jobless pay their mortgages.

That has got to be more effective than all those silly loan modifications.

And locally, the number of foreclosed homes sitting empty in neighborhoods across Boston is also starting to fall markedly.At one point, there were nearly 1,200 foreclosure specials out there in neighborhoods like Dorchester, Roxbury, East Boston and Mattapan.

That number has since plunged to 778, Evelyn Friedman, head of the Department of Neighborhood Development, tells me.

City Hall has either purchased or put under agreement 120 foreclosed homes, which it plans to resell to local nonprofit housing organizations, developers and individual homeowners.

“I would hope in the next two or three years we would be finished with the foreclosure problem here in Boston,” Friedman said.

Bold words yes, but backed up with some real action.

Boston foreclosed homes for sale continue to rise in affluent suburbs as unemployment creeps into upscale communities, jumbo lending becomes restricted and property values fall to their lowest levels, based on data from real estate research company Warren Group.

In Nantucket, upscale houses priced at $1.6 million in 2008 were being sold off at $1.2 million in 2009. Partly because of this drop in values, 19 homes in the area went into foreclosure in 2009.

In Weston, where six million-dollar homes were foreclosed in 2009, homes priced at $1.5 million in 2007 were being sold off at $1.2 million in the latter part of 2009.

In Wellesley, nine upscale homes priced between $870,000 and $3.6 million have been thrown into the foreclosure process. Homes worth more than $1 million in 2007 are now priced at around $847,500. Because of the tightening of jumbo credit, flipping houses in this upscale community has become impossible, with home sales dropping from 315 units in 2008 to 267 units in 2009.

Bruce Marks, CEO of Jamaica Plain-based nonprofit Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America, said that for the first time, wealthy communities never touched by difficulties such as Freddie Mac foreclosures are experiencing what minority and low-income communities have been experiencing for many years.

Based on the Warren Group report, the number of Boston foreclosed homes for sale surged as delinquent mortgages in affluent suburbs tripled and quadrupled in number in 2009.

The numbers of foreclosed properties in the affluent suburbs of Concord, Nantucket, Winchester and Weston are small compared to the hundreds of foreclosures in lower-income communities like Springfield, Lynn and Worcester, but the occurrence of foreclosures in these wealthy enclaves show that the 8.8-percent jobless rate and the declining economy are affecting all communities.

Statewide, completed foreclosures dropped by nearly 27 percent in 2009 to 8,409 cases, but foreclosure petitions increased by almost 29 percent to 25,868, showing that many homeowners are still experiencing harrowing financial difficulties.

While foreclosures in lower income neighborhoods have slowed down, foreclosures in wealthy enclaves have surged. In Worcester, foreclosures fell by almost 37 percent. In Dorchester, the Boston area most battered by abandoned buildings and boarded-up homes, foreclosures fell by 41 percent.

Wealthier neighborhoods, in contrast, increased their foreclosure rates by three- to four-digit percentages. In Nantucket, for instance, foreclosures increased in 2009 by 1,800 percent.