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The national mortgage delinquency rate declined for the 10th consecutive quarter in the second quarter of 2014 and is at its lowest level since 2008, according to TransUnion's quarterly mortgage report. The rate of U.S. mortgage delinquencies, defined as those in which the borrower is more than 60 days delinquent on the mortgage account, fell from 3.61 percent in the first quarter to 3.46 percent in the second quarter. The delinquency rate is down 20 percent from the second quarter of 2013 when a rate of 4.32 percent was reported.
Borrowers below the age of 30 had the lowest delinquency rate for the second quarter of 2014 at 2.34 percent, which is a decline of 28.6 percent from the second quarter of 2013. This group owns only 4.16 percent of all mortgage accounts in the U.S., however. The demographic with the largest share of mortgage accounts with 27.06 percent was age 50 to 59, with a delinquency rate equal to that of the national average at 3.46 percent. The age group with the highest delinquency rate of 4.43 percent was age 40 to 49, which owns 24.66 percent of all mortgages in the U.S.
Residential construction is on its way up, with building permit authorizations for privately owned housing units increasing by 8.1 percent from June to July and rising 7.7 percent from July 2013, according to data released on August 19 by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the U.S. Census Bureau. The number of permits issued for housing units had a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.05 million, an increase from 973,000 in June and from 977,000 from July of last year. The number of permits issued to single families also increased from an annual rate of 634,000 in June to 640,000 in July.
