In the month of November, 33,000 U.S. home foreclosures were completed, down 2% month over month and down 18.8% from a total of 41,000 in November 2014, according to CoreLogic. The research firm notes that the current foreclosure inventory totaled 1.2% of all homes with a mortgage in the United States, down from 1.5% in November of 2014.

The number of U.S. homes in some stage of foreclosure totaled approximately 448,000, compared with 573,000 in November 2014. That represents a decline in the national foreclosure inventory of 21.8%, compared with November a year ago.

The four states and the District of Columbia with the largest foreclosed inventory as a percentage of mortgaged properties are New Jersey (4.4%), New York (3.5%), Hawaii (2.5%), Florida (2.4%) and D.C. (2.4%). The five states with the lowest inventories of foreclosed properties are Alaska (0.3%), Minnesota (0.3%), Arizona (0.4%), Colorado (0.4%) and Utah (0.4%).

The five states with the highest number of completed foreclosures in the past 12 months were Florida (83,000), Michigan (51,000), Texas (29,000), California (24,000) and Georgia (24,000). The five states with the fewest foreclosures in the prior 12 months through November were District of Columbia (78), North Dakota (225), Wyoming (543), West Virginia (565) and Hawaii (686).
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CoreLogic’s chief economist said:

After peaking at 3.6 percent in January 2011, the foreclosure rate currently stand at 1.2 percent—a remarkable improvement. While there are still pockets of areas with high foreclosure activity, 30 states have foreclosure rates below the national average which is evidence of the solid improvement.

The company’s CEO added:

Tight post-crash underwriting standards coupled with much improved economic and housing market fundamentals have combined to push new mortgage delinquencies to 15-year lows. Although judicial states will likely continue to lag, given current trends, it is reasonable to expect a continued and significant drop in the rate of serious delinquencies and foreclosure starts in 2016.

Of the 10 largest U.S. metro areas, the foreclosure inventory was highest in the New York area, at 3.5%. Chicago’s foreclosure inventory totaled 1.6%, and Washington, D.C., posted a total of 1.0%.

Florida and Minnesota posted year-over-year declines of more than 30% in foreclosure inventory. Florida’s foreclosure inventory has fallen 40.7% in the past 12 months, and Minnesota’s has dropped by 31.1%.

According to CoreLogic, the current foreclosure rate of 1.2% is the same as the December 2007 rate, and the foreclosure inventory has declined every month for the past 49 months. Before the collapse in the housing market in 2007, the average number of foreclosures completed in a month was 21,000.

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