Hong Zhang Lin lost his home in Oakland’s Fruitvale District in a foreclosure auction this month.

The 44-year-old former construction worker, who is disabled by Parkinson’s disease, can barely believe it. He’s not a subprime borrower, he has a huge amount of equity in the home, and he has made all his mortgage payments on time. The four-bedroom house, which Lin and his two brothers bought in 1992, is worth about $500,000; he only owes $94,000 on the mortgage.

Lenders foreclosed on a record 3,242 Bay Area homes in the third quarter - a 622 percent increase from the same time last year - and there’s no sign of relief ahead, according to a real estate report Friday.

Statewide, foreclosure activity hit all-time highs for the quarter. Bank repossessions were up more than 600 percent, and late notices were 2.7 times higher than a year ago, according to DataQuick Information Services, a research firm in La Jolla (San Diego County).

Most ominously, the report showed that default notices, the first step in the foreclosure process, were growing more rapidly in the state and Bay Area compared with last year and earlier this year.

Editor - I smiled as I read “Flying the coop - to become renters!” (Oct. 20) because it describes our situation.

My husband and I feel as if we are going against mainstream attitudes and logic because we are renting. We have owned homes during the past 14 years, but three months ago we began renting a three-bedroom, three-bathroom townhouse in a more expensive area of Hudson, Wis. (near the Twin Cities). We have pets and two kids, but this townhouse is perfect for us at this time. We pay $1,200 a month.