NEW YORK - August 14, 2008 - Banks repossessed almost three times as many U.S. homes in July as a year earlier and the number of properties at risk of foreclosure jumped 55 percent as falling prices made it harder to sell or refinance.

Bank seizures rose 184 percent to 77,295, the steepest increase since reporting began in January 2005, RealtyTrac Inc., an Irvine, California-based seller of foreclosure data, said today in a statement. More than 272,000 properties, or one in 464 U.S. households, got a default notice, were warned of a pending auction or foreclosed on.

“It's getting worse,” Rick Sharga, RealtyTrac's executive vice president for marketing, said in an interview. “The number of properties that have been foreclosed on by the banks and still haven't sold is the highest we've ever seen.”