Oil costs more than at any time in history, gasoline prices are shattering records in California again and our president says we’re addicted to petroleum.

So are we any closer to kicking the habit?

The answer appears to be yes.

It took soaring prices and the fear of global warming to accomplish, but society may finally have started the long process of weaning itself off of oil. Whether we stay on that path remains to be seen.

California is pushing hard to increase the use of alternative fuels. Within three years, the amount of ethanol blended into the gas Californians buy will rise by 66 percent, and the state is contemplating bigger increases. Last year’s federal energy law mandated that production of renewable fuels must jump more than 500 percent by 2022. All three leading presidential candidates, Republican and Democrat, have called for capping the carbon dioxide emissions that come from burning fossil fuels such as oil.

Meanwhile, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs are racing to develop fuels and electric cars that consumers will want to buy, hoping to harness the power of the marketplace to effect change.

And believe it or not, Americans are buying less gasoline.

The drop is small at the national level - just 0.9 percent in the past month - but any decline is considered rare. Although the decrease just started elsewhere in the county, California’s gasoline sales have been falling for about two years.

Whether the decline represents the temporary thrift of price-shocked drivers or the start of something larger won’t be known for months or years. But taken together, these developments within the government, the business world and the public at large suggest a new determination to cut back on oil, if not replace it altogether.

“I have no question that we can - sustainably, without significant new land use - replace all our petroleum,” said Silicon Valley investor Vinod Khosla. He has pumped money into developing cellulosic ethanol, which can be made from crop waste and wood chips rather than corn.

“It will be four years before the world believes we have a solution,” he said. “Once the world believes it, then it will scale.” It may take decades

Many people in the energy world don’t share his optimism. Some say oil can be replaced, but only after decades of effort. Others insist that alternative fuels will supplement oil but never replace it, at least not in our lifetimes.

“Actually replacing oil? I don’t even know if that’s even feasible,” said Gordon Schremp, fuels specialist for the California Energy Commission.

On the corporate side of the ledger, the oil industry doesn’t plan on disappearing.

Several oil companies, such as BP and Chevron, are exploring biofuels. But the industry insists that petroleum will remain vital to the economy for the foreseeable future.

“I think we’re on a path to a more diverse fuel future,” said Joe Sparano, president of the Western States Petroleum Association, an oil industry trade group. “And I think it’s a good thing. And petroleum will for many, many decades be a cornerstone of that future.”

America has started down this road before, only to lose interest when oil prices dropped. California, for example, tested the use of methanol as an alternative fuel in the 1980s and 1990s before finally folding the project.

“When we did that, we walked away from the oil-displacement opportunity that (methanol) could provide,” said Peter Ward, a California Energy Commission policy adviser who worked on the program. “It was a step back, in that regard.”

Make no mistake: The world’s demand for oil remains enormous - about 85 million barrels per day. And it’s growing, with China, India and the rest of the developing world consuming more each year.

The United States devours more than 20 million barrels per day, with almost half of that made into gasoline. American drivers burn about 141 billion gallons of gas every year. In California, it’s close to 16 billion gallons per year.

But starting in March 2006, California gasoline sales began to slip.

The percentages were small - 1.2 percent in March, compared with the same month of 2005, and 1.6 percent in April - but they caught the attention of energy analysts. Gasoline sales usually rise about 2 percent every year, if for no other reason than population growth. Sales sometimes flat-line or dip during recessions, but California’s economy in 2006 seemed strong.

Gas prices, however, were soaring. They reached $3.38 for a gallon of regular in mid-May of 2006, a record at the time. How people cut back

Most people can’t stop driving altogether. While the Bay Area has an extensive network of buses, ferries and trains, most Californians can’t rely on mass transit. So how were they able to cut back?

Some found ways to combine errands and reduce the number of car trips they took each week. Those who could tried mass transit, with BART ridership growing 5.1 percent in 2006 and 4.8 percent in 2007.

Many people bought gas-sipping cars, including hybrids. Connie Berto and her husband, Frank, bought a Prius three years ago and now see so many near their San Anselmo home that she refers to them as “a pluribus of Pri-i.” The Bertos get about 50 to 52 miles per gallon.

“I am an oil brat,” she explained. “My father was with Standard Oil, my husband was with Chevron. We are committed to conserving our resources.”

Hybrid car sales grew an average of 89 percent per year from 2001 through 2006, the last year for which the energy commission has complete data. But for all their popularity, hybrids still represented 0.6 percent of all the vehicles registered in California in 2006 - nowhere near enough to dent gasoline use.

A more likely explanation for the drop in gas sales may be that, rather than buying a new car, many Californians simply used the most efficient cars they already had. Most families own more than one vehicle, and when the price of gas rises, many leave the Yukon at home and drive the Civic.

Chris Murphy used to take his Land Rover to work at his warehousing and logistics business in Modesto. But as pump prices climbed, he shifted to driving his wife’s Volkswagen Beetle. “When I picked up my clients, they’d say, ‘Ooh, cool Beetle,’ ” Murphy said. “It never turned out to be a business problem.”

Murphy has no intention of driving the SUV again for his commute or for errands around town, and it’s easy to see why. The Land Rover costs $75 to fill up, the Beetle $42.

“I wouldn’t go back,” he said. “I’m not put out at all. The worst thing that could happen is for the fuel price to go down and everyone would want their GTO again.” Telecommuting helps

In addition, many Californians are working from home at least part of the time. This trend has been developing for years and can’t explain a sudden drop in gasoline sales, but it may be reducing demand in the long term.

Lisa Fulker works from her Palo Alto home three or four days a week as a senior brand programs manager for Sun Microsystems. She first tried it in 1998, when she had two small children to care for, and says working from home saves her time that would have been spent getting dressed and commuting. Sun encourages telecommuting, with 55 percent of its 35,000 employees working outside the office on a regular basis.

“I pretty much don’t go into the office unless I have a meeting where I want to be face-to-face with people,” Fulker said. “It just doesn’t make sense for me to drive 10 minutes to sit in an office by myself.”

As unusual as the drop in California’s gasoline sales may be, the overall amounts remain small.

According to the California Board of Equalization, the amount of gas sold in the state fell by 112.5 million gallons from 2005 to 2006. That sounds like a lot, but it’s a decrease of just 0.7 percent. The board does not have complete data for 2007, but in the year’s first 11 months, sales dropped 1.2 percent.

The sheer size of the gasoline market drives skepticism that oil can quickly be replaced, or even be replaced at all.

Ethanol and biodiesel are the only nonpetroleum fuels made in quantity in the United States. And while production of each has swelled in recent years, both remain tiny compared with America’s demand for fuel. Biorefineries last year churned out 6.5 billion gallons of ethanol and 450 million gallons of biodiesel, according to the federal government. Lump those two together and they’re still just 5 percent as large as America’s annual gasoline consumption.

Biofuel advocates, however, aren’t scared by the numbers. Instead, they see America’s thirst for fuel as an immense business opportunity that will make some people very rich.

Khosla’s finance company, Khosla Ventures, estimates that America could produce 5 billion gallons of cellulosic ethanol per year by 2015, 30 billion gallons by 2020 and 150 billion gallons by 2030. It could be done using forest waste and winter cover crops on active farmland, as well as rotating energy-producing crops with those used for food. Ethanol quandary

Most ethanol in the Unites States comes from corn, and critics fear that increasing production will push food prices higher.

If Khosla is right, however, that stark choice between growing crops for food or fuel can be avoided. A cellulosic ethanol plant funded by his firm is under construction in Georgia and should begin production in 2009, making ethanol from wood scraps. “My bet is in the four- or five-year timeframe, you’ll hear experts say oil would have to drop to $50 a barrel to compete with these nonfood crops,” Khosla said.

Other entrepreneurs are designing a new generation of electric cars, or perfecting plug-in hybrids that run mostly on electricity. Although it takes years for a new type of engine to come into widespread use - witness the Prius - these people foresee a future in which American drivers rely mostly on the electric grid, not the gas or ethanol pump.

At the same time, they hope to increase the use of renewable sources of electricity, such as wind farms and large-scale solar plants, so the grid isn’t powered entirely by natural gas or coal.

Whether any of these grand ideas pans out remains a huge question. Even if one or more succeeds, America will still be using oil for years to come, to make gasoline as well as countless industrial chemicals. But it is possible that the transition away from oil has begun.

“Short term, we’re stuck with it because it’s incredibly convenient and we’ve built a whole economic system to take advantage of that,” said Daniel Kammen, a professor in the Energy and Resources Group at UC Berkeley. “I’m short-term pessimistic and long-term optimistic.”

E-mail David R. Baker at dbaker@sfchronicle.com.

Oil costs more than at any time in history, gasoline prices are shattering records in California again and our president says we’re addicted to petroleum.

So are we any closer to kicking the habit?

The answer appears to be yes.

It took soaring prices and the fear of global warming to accomplish, but society may finally have started the long process of weaning itself off of oil. Whether we stay on that path remains to be seen.

California is pushing hard to increase the use of alternative fuels. Within three years, the amount of ethanol blended into the gas Californians buy will rise by 66 percent, and the state is contemplating bigger increases. Last year’s federal energy law mandated that production of renewable fuels must jump more than 500 percent by 2022. All three leading presidential candidates, Republican and Democrat, have called for capping the carbon dioxide emissions that come from burning fossil fuels such as oil.

Meanwhile, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs are racing to develop fuels and electric cars that consumers will want to buy, hoping to harness the power of the marketplace to effect change.

And believe it or not, Americans are buying less gasoline.

The drop is small at the national level - just 0.9 percent in the past month - but any decline is considered rare. Although the decrease just started elsewhere in the county, California’s gasoline sales have been falling for about two years.

Whether the decline represents the temporary thrift of price-shocked drivers or the start of something larger won’t be known for months or years. But taken together, these developments within the government, the business world and the public at large suggest a new determination to cut back on oil, if not replace it altogether.

“I have no question that we can - sustainably, without significant new land use - replace all our petroleum,” said Silicon Valley investor Vinod Khosla. He has pumped money into developing cellulosic ethanol, which can be made from crop waste and wood chips rather than corn.

“It will be four years before the world believes we have a solution,” he said. “Once the world believes it, then it will scale.” It may take decades

Many people in the energy world don’t share his optimism. Some say oil can be replaced, but only after decades of effort. Others insist that alternative fuels will supplement oil but never replace it, at least not in our lifetimes.

“Actually replacing oil? I don’t even know if that’s even feasible,” said Gordon Schremp, fuels specialist for the California Energy Commission.

On the corporate side of the ledger, the oil industry doesn’t plan on disappearing.

Several oil companies, such as BP and Chevron, are exploring biofuels. But the industry insists that petroleum will remain vital to the economy for the foreseeable future.

“I think we’re on a path to a more diverse fuel future,” said Joe Sparano, president of the Western States Petroleum Association, an oil industry trade group. “And I think it’s a good thing. And petroleum will for many, many decades be a cornerstone of that future.”

America has started down this road before, only to lose interest when oil prices dropped. California, for example, tested the use of methanol as an alternative fuel in the 1980s and 1990s before finally folding the project.

“When we did that, we walked away from the oil-displacement opportunity that (methanol) could provide,” said Peter Ward, a California Energy Commission policy adviser who worked on the program. “It was a step back, in that regard.”

Make no mistake: The world’s demand for oil remains enormous - about 85 million barrels per day. And it’s growing, with China, India and the rest of the developing world consuming more each year.

The United States devours more than 20 million barrels per day, with almost half of that made into gasoline. American drivers burn about 141 billion gallons of gas every year. In California, it’s close to 16 billion gallons per year.

But starting in March 2006, California gasoline sales began to slip.

The percentages were small - 1.2 percent in March, compared with the same month of 2005, and 1.6 percent in April - but they caught the attention of energy analysts. Gasoline sales usually rise about 2 percent every year, if for no other reason than population growth. Sales sometimes flat-line or dip during recessions, but California’s economy in 2006 seemed strong.

Gas prices, however, were soaring. They reached $3.38 for a gallon of regular in mid-May of 2006, a record at the time. How people cut back

Most people can’t stop driving altogether. While the Bay Area has an extensive network of buses, ferries and trains, most Californians can’t rely on mass transit. So how were they able to cut back?

Some found ways to combine errands and reduce the number of car trips they took each week. Those who could tried mass transit, with BART ridership growing 5.1 percent in 2006 and 4.8 percent in 2007.

Many people bought gas-sipping cars, including hybrids. Connie Berto and her husband, Frank, bought a Prius three years ago and now see so many near their San Anselmo home that she refers to them as “a pluribus of Pri-i.” The Bertos get about 50 to 52 miles per gallon.

“I am an oil brat,” she explained. “My father was with Standard Oil, my husband was with Chevron. We are committed to conserving our resources.”

Hybrid car sales grew an average of 89 percent per year from 2001 through 2006, the last year for which the energy commission has complete data. But for all their popularity, hybrids still represented 0.6 percent of all the vehicles registered in California in 2006 - nowhere near enough to dent gasoline use.

A more likely explanation for the drop in gas sales may be that, rather than buying a new car, many Californians simply used the most efficient cars they already had. Most families own more than one vehicle, and when the price of gas rises, many leave the Yukon at home and drive the Civic.

Chris Murphy used to take his Land Rover to work at his warehousing and logistics business in Modesto. But as pump prices climbed, he shifted to driving his wife’s Volkswagen Beetle. “When I picked up my clients, they’d say, ‘Ooh, cool Beetle,’ ” Murphy said. “It never turned out to be a business problem.”

Murphy has no intention of driving the SUV again for his commute or for errands around town, and it’s easy to see why. The Land Rover costs $75 to fill up, the Beetle $42.

“I wouldn’t go back,” he said. “I’m not put out at all. The worst thing that could happen is for the fuel price to go down and everyone would want their GTO again.” Telecommuting helps

In addition, many Californians are working from home at least part of the time. This trend has been developing for years and can’t explain a sudden drop in gasoline sales, but it may be reducing demand in the long term.

Lisa Fulker works from her Palo Alto home three or four days a week as a senior brand programs manager for Sun Microsystems. She first tried it in 1998, when she had two small children to care for, and says working from home saves her time that would have been spent getting dressed and commuting. Sun encourages telecommuting, with 55 percent of its 35,000 employees working outside the office on a regular basis.

“I pretty much don’t go into the office unless I have a meeting where I want to be face-to-face with people,” Fulker said. “It just doesn’t make sense for me to drive 10 minutes to sit in an office by myself.”

As unusual as the drop in California’s gasoline sales may be, the overall amounts remain small.

According to the California Board of Equalization, the amount of gas sold in the state fell by 112.5 million gallons from 2005 to 2006. That sounds like a lot, but it’s a decrease of just 0.7 percent. The board does not have complete data for 2007, but in the year’s first 11 months, sales dropped 1.2 percent.

The sheer size of the gasoline market drives skepticism that oil can quickly be replaced, or even be replaced at all.

Ethanol and biodiesel are the only nonpetroleum fuels made in quantity in the United States. And while production of each has swelled in recent years, both remain tiny compared with America’s demand for fuel. Biorefineries last year churned out 6.5 billion gallons of ethanol and 450 million gallons of biodiesel, according to the federal government. Lump those two together and they’re still just 5 percent as large as America’s annual gasoline consumption.

Biofuel advocates, however, aren’t scared by the numbers. Instead, they see America’s thirst for fuel as an immense business opportunity that will make some people very rich.

Khosla’s finance company, Khosla Ventures, estimates that America could produce 5 billion gallons of cellulosic ethanol per year by 2015, 30 billion gallons by 2020 and 150 billion gallons by 2030. It could be done using forest waste and winter cover crops on active farmland, as well as rotating energy-producing crops with those used for food. Ethanol quandary

Most ethanol in the Unites States comes from corn, and critics fear that increasing production will push food prices higher.

If Khosla is right, however, that stark choice between growing crops for food or fuel can be avoided. A cellulosic ethanol plant funded by his firm is under construction in Georgia and should begin production in 2009, making ethanol from wood scraps. “My bet is in the four- or five-year timeframe, you’ll hear experts say oil would have to drop to $50 a barrel to compete with these nonfood crops,” Khosla said.

Other entrepreneurs are designing a new generation of electric cars, or perfecting plug-in hybrids that run mostly on electricity. Although it takes years for a new type of engine to come into widespread use - witness the Prius - these people foresee a future in which American drivers rely mostly on the electric grid, not the gas or ethanol pump.

At the same time, they hope to increase the use of renewable sources of electricity, such as wind farms and large-scale solar plants, so the grid isn’t powered entirely by natural gas or coal.

Whether any of these grand ideas pans out remains a huge question. Even if one or more succeeds, America will still be using oil for years to come, to make gasoline as well as countless industrial chemicals. But it is possible that the transition away from oil has begun.

“Short term, we’re stuck with it because it’s incredibly convenient and we’ve built a whole economic system to take advantage of that,” said Daniel Kammen, a professor in the Energy and Resources Group at UC Berkeley. “I’m short-term pessimistic and long-term optimistic.”

E-mail David R. Baker at dbaker@sfchronicle.com.

Doug Odom, a deputy sheriff with Contra Costa County, rapped loudly on the front door of a one-story prefabricated home in Brentwood, just off a dirt road where horses grazed.

“Sheriff’s office, come to the door,” he called.

After a moment, the door swung open to reveal a middle-aged woman in a red T-shirt and blue jeans.

“We’re doing the eviction,” Odom told her. “Are you ready to go? … I need you to get your shoes, purse, whatever you need to get and come outside now.”

The woman’s shoulders slumped. “Can you wait, like, 24 hours?” she asked.

“We’re going to have to do the eviction now,” Odom replied as he and his partner, Deputy Sheriff Alex Custodio, followed her inside. A Realtor and two locksmiths waited outside to reclaim the house, which had reverted to the lender, Option One Mortgage Corp., at a foreclosure auction in December.

Such scenes are increasingly common as an ever-growing number of households default on their mortgages and fall into foreclosure.

Once a bank repossesses a house, it wants a vacant property that can be sold quickly. If homeowners don’t leave voluntarily, banks go to court to get an eviction order. The sheriff’s office has the grim task of enforcing those orders.

In Contra Costa, the Bay Area county with the most foreclosures, deputies do 45 evictions a week, up 30 percent from last year, according to Custodio. The sheriff’s department gets $125 per foreclosure, a rate set by the state that only partly offsets the cost.

Foreclosures are as location-dependent as everything in real estate. Overall, the Bay Area has had fewer than other regions nationwide. But the situation is starkly worse in outlying pockets, such as the Contra Costa neighborhoods where the deputies do evictions.

In eastern Antioch, 4.1 percent of all homes and condos went through foreclosure in 2007, according to DataQuick Information Systems. That’s as bad as the hardest-hit neighborhood of Stockton - often cited as the foreclosure capital of California and even the nation.

In eastern Contra Costa, more than 2 percent of all homes in eight ZIP codes were foreclosed on in 2007, a rate that rivals most Stockton neighborhoods. Two-person team kept busy

In Contra Costa, a rotating two-person team of deputies does evictions three days a week, with a grueling schedule to cover a vast geographic territory.

“We have one every 15 minutes including drive time,” said Custodio, who has been doing evictions for four years. On Tuesday, the Brentwood eviction was the duo’s fifth call of the day; they had an additional dozen scheduled afterward.

Until recently, the vast majority were of tenants who fell behind on their rent. Only 10 percent were foreclosures. Now one-third are foreclosures. That comes to about 720 foreclosure evictions a year, or just under one-fifth of the 4,000 Contra Costa homes that went into foreclosure in 2007.

Not all foreclosures lead to an eviction; many former homeowners move out before it gets to that point. Often the lender pays them a couple of thousand dollars to move out by a certain date. But some people stay until the last moment, hoping against hope to hang on to their homes.

People get plenty of warning during the foreclosure process, which takes from six to 12 months. Then they get a “notice to vacate” from the sheriff at least six days before the eviction date.

“There are a few who are holdouts,” Custodio said. “I try to be as courteous as possible; allow them to gather a few things, a toothbrush.”

Still, the deputies draw their guns before entering a seemingly vacant residence. Talking to avoid trouble

“We have some where they tell you they’re not going anywhere,” Odom said. “You talk and reason with them. Most people, when they get the understanding that their other option is to be arrested and go to jail” agree to leave voluntarily.

A whole crew assembles for evictions. There are the two deputies in a patrol car - they take a “cage unit” car in case they have to arrest someone for refusing to vacate. At each property, they are met by the owner or a representative. When it’s a foreclosure, that generally means a Realtor or property manager hired by the bank. Often, the owner also arranges for a locksmith to be there to rekey the property or to gain entry if necessary.

The deputies will not kick in a door. “It is not the sheriff’s office policy to destroy property, unless it’s an exigent circumstance,” Custodio said.

Odom, who has been on eviction patrol for just a few months after nine years as a county patrol officer, had already witnessed a particularly dramatic incident with a foreclosed homeowner.

“We had one where we thought nobody was there,” he said. “The locksmith was working on changing the locks. Then a guy came to the screen door - he had slit his wrists and had blood running down both arms. He said let him alone to die in peace.”

After calling for police backup, Odom was able to persuade the man to get in an ambulance to go to the hospital. His injuries turned out not to be serious.

“It was more for dramatic effect,” Odom said. “He had owned the house 10 or 15 years and he was depressed (to be losing it). He wasn’t violent. I tried to explain to him that life goes on; this is a bad thing, but it’s not worth killing yourself over.”

Both deputies said the Brentwood eviction was comparatively easy.

“She was pretty agreeable,” Odom said. “It went pretty smoothly.”

Odom had already been to the Brentwood house a week earlier and served former owner Ellen Anderson, the woman in the T-shirt, with a warning notice of the eviction date.

Back in January, Dori Anderson (no relation to Ellen Anderson), a Realtor with Cypress Lakes Realty hired by Option One to sell the house, had met with Ellen Anderson and offered her “cash for keys” - a payment of $2,500 to be out within a month. Dori Anderson said the woman asked for three months time to move, which the bank would not grant.

On the day of the eviction, Ellen Anderson was only partially packed up when the deputies arrived a little before noon. A fire burned in the freestanding stove. Papers were stacked on the floor; cooking utensils and food were scattered around the kitchen.

Anderson collapsed onto a couch after letting in Odom and Custodio, who kept up a series of questions: “Is there anyone else in the house?” “Are there any weapons in the house?” “Are you waiting for a ride?” She answered “no” to each question - until they asked if she had been drinking that day. Anderson responded that she had had a couple of beers.

“Do you mind if I take a look at your eyes?” the deputy said. “If you’re going to drive, I want to make sure you’re all right.”

Looking distraught, Anderson apologized for the mess. She said she and her husband are getting a divorce and couldn’t make the monthly payment, which had risen to $4,500.

“Yes, it’s a tough situation for a lot of people,” Odom replied. “Where are your keys at? Let’s starting working on getting your keys, your wallet, your purse, all that. You’ll have 15 days from today to come back and get the rest of your stuff.” House returns to company

Odom went to the front door and taped a “Notice of restoration” outside, indicating that the house now belonged to Option One. The deputies keep a copy and give another copy to the new owner.

Ellen Anderson collected an armful of DVDs.

“My divorce cannot come through soon enough,” she said. She said her soon-to-be-ex husband had already moved out to another house in Concord the couple had bought together.

She gestured at the kitchen ceiling. “This … all leaks,” she said. “You can’t get refinanced because it’s a manufactured home. It’s 20 years old. They don’t last.”

The couple bought the house about 10 years ago, she said. Ellen Anderson said she has been a stay-at-home mom of four kids, now ages 13 to 26. Her husband does drywall installation.

Dori Anderson, the Realtor, put a hand on Ellen Anderson’s shoulder. “Legally, I have to rekey the doors,” she said. “While (the locksmith) is rekeying, you go in and take what you need to take; get your toothbrush, pack a suitcase.”

“What do I do?” Ellen Anderson asked, almost rhetorically. “I’m going to try to rent a place, but my divorce isn’t final. Today I guess I’ll go down to Martinez with my parents.” Foreclosure breeding ground

Eviction duty has given the deputy sheriffs an up-close and personal look at the fallout from the subprime crisis.

In Contra Costa, many of the foreclosure evictions are in the new subdivisions that sprang up in recent years. Prices in those subdivisions rose rapidly during the real estate boom days but now have fallen almost as rapidly. In places such as Antioch, Pittsburg and Discovery Bay, homes that went for $650,000 a couple of years ago are now selling for $450,000 or so.

People who bought those homes with no money down now owe more than their home is worth. That, combined with adjustable mortgages resetting to higher rates, is a breeding ground for foreclosure.

Most struggling homeowners try to sell, but they’re competing with the lower prices banks offer on already-foreclosed homes.

“Look at this block,” Custodio said, gesturing at a subdivision of cookie-cutter houses in Pittsburg. “You can see all those for-sale signs. More than likely, we’ll be out here posting them” for a notice of eviction.

Custodio has seen the role real estate speculation played in fueling the foreclosures.

“In talking to some people (being evicted) they tried to buy other property; they tried to add to their wealth by owning,” he said. “People tried to capitalize on the boom when values were skyrocketing.”

Still, he doesn’t fault them.

“Most folks are decent people,” he said. “They just wanted a little more, but it didn’t work out for them. Hopefully things will get better for folks.”

– For a video of Contra Costa sheriff’s deputies performing evictions, go to sfgate.com/business.Foreclosure timeline

Default: When a homeowner falls about 90 days behind on mortgage payments, the lender sends a notice of default.

Notice of trustee sale: Three months (or more) after the notice of default, the lender can announce that it is putting the property up for auction. It must give at least 21 days’ notice.

Auction: Foreclosure properties are auctioned on county courthouse steps, generally for the amount owed on the mortgage. Sales are all cash and as is. Most homes revert to the lender at auction. Then, a trustee’s deed is filed with the county certifying the new owner.

Eviction: If the former homeowner does not move out, the new owner can get a court eviction order. Deputy sheriffs then serve a notice to vacate and return six days later for the eviction. The person is evicted and a “notice of restoration” is posted. The former occupant has 15 days to reclaim possessions. Resources

Here are some places homeowners facing foreclosure can turn for assistance:

Your bank: Lenders stress that homeowners should contact them if they anticipate trouble making their mortgage payments. Ask to speak to the workout department about a loan modification or forbearance.

Homeownership Preservation Foundation: This nonprofit offers free foreclosure-avoidance counseling and assistance contacting lenders. (888) 995-4673; links.sfgate.com/ZMV.

HUD-approved housing counseling agencies: The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development sponsors housing counseling agencies throughout the country that offer advice at little or no cost. links.sfgate.com/ZMW.

Source: Chronicle research

E-mail Carolyn Said at csaid@sfchronicle.com.