U.S. foreclosure filings rose 15% in January to over 300,000. This is the eleventh straight month that foreclosures have passed 300,000.

Here is the situation:

• 315,716 properties received a notice of default, one in every 409 households.
• Bank seizures may rise to 3 million this year, according to Realty Trac.

Deutsche Bank (NYSE: DB) expects almost half of all U.S. homeowners to be underwater -- figuratively, of course -- by 2011.

Declines in home prices and the fact that some of those difficult mortgages just aren't going away put 26% of homeowners in this situation by the end of last March, and it seems the situation is only going to get worse. Unlike the early stages of the credit crisis, which were driven by subprime mortgages, the next iteration will have a greater effect on prime mortgage borrowers, which comprise two-thirds of the loans outstanding.

A 43-state study conducted by First American CoreLogic adds more gloom and doom to the housing market. The numbers are shocking. Twenty percent, one in five US homeowners with a mortgage, owe more than their homes are worth. We call this being "underwater." This amounts to a staggering 8.31 million properties, up 9% from the end of September.

The worst states are Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada and Ohio. Of these seven states, California, Florida and Nevada led in the number of underwater mortgages.