Virtual foreclosure vultures circling overhead

Considering the attention the collapse of the sub-prime mortgage industry is suffering and the continued rippling shocks, (the Dow is plunging again today, down 184 points as of 3:34PM EST; FINISHED at -207.61, did the Fed stepped in to prevent yet more disconcerting market behaviour?), the attendant foreclosure boom the country is experiencing was bound to turn into a bonanza for engaging entrepreneurs. Which means that it isn't too surprising to see that some other engaging entrepreneurs have turned Google maps into a foreclosure tracking tool.

Indeed, from the comfort of the keyboard, visitors of ForeclosureRadar.com (beta) can perform virtual fly-overs of all malign properties of the recently evicted. Complete with full spectrum presentation of high-to-low "activity," "pre-foreclosure," "bank-owned," and "auction" status, viewers and prospective property predators can view the foreclosure markets in a variety of parameter spaces, allowing one to really zero-in on the optimal target in what is an increasingly target-rich environment.

They aren't kidding about this being beta, though. California appears to be the only state available so far. Which is certainly where a lot of carrion lie, so it was probably the obvious place to start.