CoreLogic Reports January 2015 National Foreclosure Inventory Down 33.2 Percent Year Over Year

Completed foreclosures are an indication of the total number of homes actually lost to foreclosure. Since the financial crisis began in September 2008, there have been approximately 5.5 million completed foreclosures across the country, and since homeownership rates peaked in the second quarter of 2004, there have been approximately 7 million homes lost to foreclosure.

As of January 2015 the national foreclosure inventory was down 33.2 percent year over year, and approximately 549,000 homes were in some stage of foreclosure.  This compares to 822,000 homes in January 2014 and represents 39 consecutive months of year-over-year declines. The foreclosure inventory as of January 2015 made up 1.4 percent of all homes with a mortgage, compared to 2.0 percent in January 2014. On a month-over-month basis, the foreclosure inventory was down 2.7 percent from December 2014. The current foreclosure rate of 1.4 percent is back to March 2008 levels.

“Job growth and home-value appreciation have worked to push the serious delinquency rate to the lowest since mid-2008 and foreclosures down by one-third from a year ago,” said Frank Nothaft, chief economist at CoreLogic. “With economic growth in 2015 expected to be better than last year, further declines in both delinquencies and foreclosures are projected for this year.”

“The foreclosure inventory continues to shrink with declines in all 50 states over the past 12 months,” said Anand Nallathambi, president and CEO of CoreLogic. “Florida, one of the hardest hit states during the foreclosure crisis, experienced a decline of almost 50 percent year over year which is outstanding news.”

Highlights as of January 2015:

• The number of mortgages in serious delinquency declined 23.8 percent from January 2014 to January 2015 with 1.5 million mortgages, or 4 percent, in serious delinquency (defined as 90 days or more past due, including those loans in foreclosure or REO). This was the lowest delinquency rate since June 2008.
• The foreclosure inventory has experienced 39 months of continuous declines and year-over-year double-digit declines for 28 consecutive months
• The five states with the highest number of completed foreclosures for the 12 months ending in January 2015 were: Florida (111,000), Michigan (51,000), Texas (34,000), California (30,000) and Georgia (28,000). These five states accounted for almost half of all completed foreclosures nationally.
• Four states and the District of Columbia experienced the lowest number of completed foreclosures for the 12 months ending in January 2015: South Dakota (22), the District of Columbia (66), North Dakota (336), West Virginia (511) and Wyoming (532).
• Four states and the District of Columbia experienced the highest foreclosure inventory as a percentage of all mortgaged homes: New Jersey (5.2 percent), New York (4.0 percent), Florida (3.5 percent), Hawaii (2.7 percent) and the District of Columbia (2.5 percent).
• The five states with the lowest foreclosure inventory as a percentage of all mortgaged homes were Alaska (0.3 percent), Nebraska (0.4 percent), North Dakota (0.4 percent), Arizona (0.5 percent) and Montana (0.5 percent).

*December data was revised. Revisions are standard, and to ensure accuracy, CoreLogic incorporates newly released data to provide updated results.

Judicial Foreclosure States Ranking (Ranked by Completed Foreclosures)

Non-Judicial Foreclosure States Ranking (Ranked by Completed Foreclosures)

Foreclosure Data for the Largest Core Based Statistical Areas (CBSAs) (Ranked by Completed Foreclosures)

Figure 1: Number of Mortgaged Homes per Completed Foreclosure

Figure 2: Foreclosure Inventory as of January 2015

Figure 3 (is a map): Foreclosure Inventory by State Map

For ongoing housing trends and data, visit the CoreLogic Insights Blog: http://www.corelogic.com/blog.

Methodology

The data in this report represents foreclosure activity reported through January 2015.

This report separates state data into judicial versus non-judicial foreclosure state categories. In judicial foreclosure states, lenders must provide evidence to the courts of delinquency in order to move a borrower into foreclosure. In non-judicial foreclosure states, lenders can issue notices of default directly to the borrower without court intervention. This is an important distinction since judicial states, as a rule, have longer foreclosure timelines, thus affecting foreclosure statistics.

A completed foreclosure occurs when a property is auctioned and results in the purchase of the home at auction by either a third party, such as an investor, or by the lender. If the home is purchased by the lender, it is moved into the lender’s real estate owned (REO) inventory. In “foreclosure by advertisement” states, a redemption period begins after the auction and runs for a statutory period, e.g., six months. During that period, the borrower may regain the foreclosed home by paying all amounts due as calculated under the statute. For purposes of this Foreclosure Report, because so few homes are actually redeemed following an auction, it is assumed that the foreclosure process ends in “foreclosure by advertisement” states at the completion of the auction.

The foreclosure inventory represents the number and share of mortgaged homes that have been placed into the process of foreclosure by the mortgage servicer. Mortgage servicers start the foreclosure process when the mortgage reaches a specific level of serious delinquency as dictated by the investor for the mortgage loan. Once a foreclosure is “started,” and absent the borrower paying all amounts necessary to halt the foreclosure, the home remains in foreclosure until the completed foreclosure results in the sale to a third party at auction or the home enters the lender’s REO inventory. The data in this report accounts for only first liens against a property and does not include secondary liens. The foreclosure inventory is measured only against homes that have an outstanding mortgage. Homes with no mortgage liens can never be in foreclosure and are, therefore, excluded from the analysis. Approximately one-third of homes nationally are owned outright and do not have a mortgage. CoreLogic has approximately 85 percent coverage of U.S. foreclosure data.

Source: CoreLogic
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About CoreLogic
CoreLogic (NYSE: CLGX) is a leading global property information, analytics and data-enabled services provider. The company’s combined data from public, contributory and proprietary sources includes over 3.5 billion records spanning more than 40 years, providing detailed coverage of property, mortgages and other encumbrances, consumer credit, tenancy, location, hazard risk and related performance information. The markets CoreLogic serves include real estate and mortgage finance, insurance, capital markets, and the public sector. CoreLogic delivers value to clients through unique data, analytics, workflow technology, advisory and managed services. Clients rely on CoreLogic to help identify and manage growth opportunities, improve performance and mitigate risk. Headquartered in Irvine, Calif., CoreLogic operates in North America, Western Europe and Asia Pacific. For more information, please visit www.corelogic.com.

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