As foreclosures spike in Minnesota, Joe the Plumber-types are going into vacant homes to ensure pipes don’t freeze and burst and cause tens of thousands of dollars in damage to a home that’s already a victim of major price plummets. 1st Class Plumbing says it received more than 100 calls last year to winterize foreclosed homes, and the small company expects many more this year.

As KAAL notes, Minnesota has a six-month redemption period, which means a homeowner who is foreclosed on has six months to buy back the property. And while that also means homes can sit vacant before a bank sells the home, the redemption period isn’t the primary culprit causing the increased number of empty homes and neighborhoods. With subrime loans still working themselves out of the system, Alt-A loans beginning to reset, and the loss of equity affecting prime borrowers, foreclosures are expected to rise 39 percent in Minnesota this year, according to a report by Housing Link.

And given the poor craftsmanship inherent in a number of slap-it-up McMansions that are now dusty and unoccupied, Joe the Plumbers should expect to get more jobs winterizing empty homes vulnerable to Minnesota’s tough winters. Poor average-Joe-Six-Pack-Plumber and his burgeoning career.

The good news? The Twin Cities actually fell in the nationwide rankings for foreclosure filings during the third quarter. Out of 100 metro-area foreclosures, Minneapolis-St. Paul ranks 61st. During that period the Twin Cities saw nearly 5,000 foreclosure filings, or about 0.38 percent of total households went into foreclosure.

However September numbers spotlight a growing problem in Minnesota. Nationwide, foreclosure numbers increased by 21 percent compared to September of 2007, while Minnesota’s rise doubled that. As we reported earlier, Housing Link projects that foreclosures will continue to rise into 2010 in Minnesota.