"Remarkable Improvement" in Foreclosure Rate -CoreLogic

The number of completed foreclosures nationwide in November was down to about 30 percent of the level in the worst days of the housing crisis.  CoreLogic's monthly National Foreclosure Report puts completed foreclosures in November at 33,000 compared to 117,657 in September 2010.  The November number is down 21.8 percent from November 2014 and is 10.9 fewer than the 38,000 completed foreclosures in October 2015.  As a basis of comparison, between 2000 and 2006 completed foreclosures averaged 21,000 per month nationwide.

The five states with the highest number of completed foreclosures for the 12 months ending in November 2015 were Florida (83,000), Michigan (51,000), Texas (29,000), California (24,000) and Georgia (24,000). These five states accounted for almost half of all completed foreclosures nationally.

The foreclosure inventory, the number of homes that are in process of foreclosure, held approximately 448,000 properties in November, 1.2 percent of all homes in the country with a mortgage.  One year earlier the rate was 1.5 percent with 573,000 in the inventory.  It was the lowest the foreclosure inventory rate has been since November 2007.

Since the financial crisis began in September 2008, there have been approximately 6 million completed foreclosures across the country, and since homeownership rates peaked in the second quarter of 2004, there have been about 8 million homes lost to foreclosure.

Four states and the District of Columbia had the highest foreclosure inventory rate in November 2015: New Jersey (4.4 percent), New York (3.5 percent), Hawaii (2.5 percent), Florida (2.4 percent) and the District of Columbia (2.4 percent). Washington, DC is the only one of these jurisdictions that does not use primarily a judicial foreclosure process.

CoreLogic also reports that the number of mortgages in serious delinquency (defined as 90 days or more past due, including loans in foreclosure or REO) declined by 21.7 percent from November 2014 to November 2015, with 1.3 million mortgages, or 3.3 percent, in this category. The November 2015 serious delinquency rate is the lowest since December 2007.

"After peaking at 3.6 percent in January 2011, the foreclosure rate currently stands at 1.2 percent-a remarkable improvement," said Dr. Frank Nothaft, chief economist for CoreLogic. "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."

"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," said Anand Nallathambi, president and CEO of CoreLogic. "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."