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Mortgage foreclosures have been shrinking, according to CoreLogic. The 30 days or more delinquency rate for June 2019 was 4%, while 4% of mortgages were delinquent by at least 30 days or more including those in foreclosure.
"A strong economy and eight-plus years of home price growth have made mortgage foreclosure an infrequent event,” said CoreLogic Chief Economist Frank Nothaft. “This backdrop will help the mortgage market limit delinquencies in most of the country whenever a downturn should start."
Despite delinquency rates sitting at their lowest levels since 1999, several states and metropolitan areas posted small annual increases in June. The highest gains were in Vermont (+0.7%), New Hampshire (+0.3%), Nebraska (+0.2%) and Minnesota (0.2%), while the other four states–Michigan, Iowa, Wisconsin and Connecticut–experienced a nominal gain of just 0.1%.
"While the nation continues to post near-record-low mortgage delinquency rates, we are seeing signs of emerging stress in some states,” said CoreLogic President and CEO Frank Martell. “We saw rates jump in states such as Vermont, New Hampshire, Nebraska and Minnesota that weren’t tied to a natural disaster."
CoreLogic identified these states as “delinquency hotspots.” City-level hotspots with delinquency increases included Janesville-Beloit, Wisconsin, with a 2.5 percentage point increase, as well as Pine Bluff, Arkansas; Panama City, Florida; Altoona, Pennsylvania; and Kokomo, Indiana.
Each state saw serious delinquency rates decrease in June 2019 except for Minnesota, Nebraska, North Dakota and Virginia, which stayed the same. Serious delinquencies increased in 20 metropolitan areas, while 48 metropolitan areas saw their serious delinquency rate stay the same.
Despite the decreases in foreclosures overall, the transition rate increase year-over-year in June. The share of mortgages that transitioned from current to 30-days past due was 1.1% in June 2019, up from 0.9% in June 2018. By comparison, in January 2007, just before the start of the financial crisis, the current-to-30-day transition rate was 1.2% and peaked in November 2008 at 2%.
Find the full report from CoreLogic here.
