August Foreclosure Inventories Highest in New York City, Miami, Las Vegas

In the month of August, 37,000 U.S. home foreclosures were completed, down 3.2% month over month and down 42.4% from a total of 64,000 in August 2015, according to CoreLogic. The research firm notes that the current foreclosure inventory totals 0.9% of all homes with a mortgage in the United States, flat compared with August of last year.

The number of U.S. homes currently in some stage of foreclosure totals approximately 351,000, compared with 499,000 in August 2015. That represents a decline in the national foreclosure inventory of 29.6%, compared with August 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 (3.2%), New York (2.9%), Maine (1.8%), Hawaii (1.8%) and D.C. (1.8%). The five states with the lowest inventories of foreclosed properties are Colorado (0.3%), Minnesota (0.3%), Utah (0.3%), Arizona (0.3%) and Michigan (0.3%).

The five states with the highest number of completed foreclosures in the past 12 months were Florida (55,000), Texas (27,000), Ohio (23,000), California (22,000) and Georgia (21,000). The five with the fewest foreclosures in the prior 12 months through August were District of Columbia (212), North Dakota (341), West Virginia (469), Alaska (624) and Montana (717).

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CoreLogic CEO Anand Nallathambi said:

Foreclosure rates and serious delinquency continued to trend down in August as real estate markets across many parts of the U.S. exhibit strong demand growth and rising prices. With the foreclosure inventory now under 1 percent nationally, the need to boost single family housing stocks through new construction will become more acute in the coming months and years.

Of the 10 largest U.S. metro areas, the foreclosure inventory was highest in the New York area, at 2.8%. The Miami metro area’s foreclosure inventory totaled 2.3%, with the Las Vegas metro at 1.3% and Chicago at 1.3%. The lowest totals were posted in the San Francisco (0.1%) area and in Denver (0.2%).

A total of 16 states posted year-over-year declines of more than 30% in foreclosure inventory for the month of August. Washington’s foreclosure inventory has fallen 39.6% in the past 12 months and Florida’s has dropped by 39.3%.

According to CoreLogic, the current foreclosure rate of 0.9% is the same as the September 2007 rate and the foreclosure inventory has declined every month for the past 58 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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