U.S. FORECLOSURE ACTIVITY DECLINES MONTHLY IN FEBRUARY 2023 BUT CONTINUES TO INCREASE ANNUALLY

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Mar 08, 2023, 00:01 ET

Overall Foreclosure Activity Down 3 Percent from January 2023; While Foreclosure Completions Increase 45 Percent Last Year

IRVINE, Calif., March 8, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- ATTOM, a leading curator of land, property, and real estate data, today released its February 2023 U.S. Foreclosure Market Report, which shows there were a total of 30,528 U.S. properties with foreclosure filings — default notices, scheduled auctions or bank repossessions — down 3 percent from a month ago and up 18 percent from a year ago.

"Foreclosure activity finally started to stabilize in February after 21 straight months of increases," said Rob Barber, chief executive officer at ATTOM. "The numbers don't yet show a clear trend toward fewer foreclosures, partly because February is a short month. But with historically high levels of home equity flowing from a decade of rising values, we may be seeing a growing number of delinquent mortgage payers with at least the option to sell before facing foreclosure."

Foreclosure completion numbers increase 45 percent from last year
Lenders repossessed 3,831 U.S. properties through completed foreclosures (REOs) in February 2023, dipping 2 percent from last month but increasing 45 percent from last year.

States that had at least 100 or more REOs and saw the greatest annual increase in completed foreclosures in February 2023 included: New York (up 268 percent); Georgia (up 237 percent); California (up 132 percent); Texas (up 87 percent); and Virginia (up 73 percent).

Those major metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) with a population greater than 200,000 that saw the greatest number of completed foreclosures (REOs) in February 2023 included: Chicago, IL (193 REOs); New York, NY (170 REOs); Detroit, MI (112 REOs); Philadelphia, PA (104 REOs); and St. Louis, MO (97 REOs).

Foreclosure starts decrease monthly in 25 states including the District of Colombia
Lenders started the foreclosure process on 20,360 U.S. properties in February 2023, down 2 percent from last month but up 23 percent from a year ago.

Those states that saw the greatest numbers of foreclosures starts in February 2023 included: Texas (2,187 foreclosure starts); California (2,133 foreclosure starts); Florida (1,831 foreclosure starts); New York (1,318 foreclosure starts); and Illinois (1,170 foreclosure starts).

Among the 223 metropolitan statistical areas with a population of at least 200,000, those that had the greatest numbers of foreclosure starts in February 2023, included: New York, NY (1,554 foreclosure starts); Chicago, IL (1,034 foreclosure starts); Los Angeles, CA (710 foreclosure starts); Houston, TX (699 foreclosure starts); and Philadelphia, PA (565 foreclosure starts).

Highest foreclosure rates in New Jersey, Maryland, and Illinois
Nationwide one in every 4,574 housing units had a foreclosure filing in February 2023. States with the highest foreclosure rates were New Jersey (one in every 2,271 housing units with a foreclosure filing); Maryland (one in every 2,390 housing units); Illinois (one in every 2,443 housing units); Nevada (one in every 2,854 housing units); and Indiana (one in every 2,956 housing units).

Among the 223 metropolitan statistical areas with a population of at least 200,000, those with the highest foreclosure rates in February 2023 were Fayetteville, NC (one in every 1,627 housing units with a foreclosure filing); Atlantic City, NJ (one in every 1,708 housing units); Florence, SC (one in every 1,833 housing units); Jacksonville, NC (one in every 1,934 housing units); and Cleveland, OH (one in every 2,049 housing units).

Other than Cleveland, among the metropolitan areas with a population greater than 1 million, those with the worst foreclosure rates in February 2023 included: Chicago, IL (one in every 2,300 housing units); Las Vegas, NV (one in every 2,305 housing units); Riverside, CA (one in every 2,450 housing); and Baltimore, MD (one in every 2,510 housing units).

Report methodology
The ATTOM U.S. Foreclosure Market Report provides a count of the total number of properties with at least one foreclosure filing entered into the ATTOM Data Warehouse during the month and quarter. Some foreclosure filings entered into the database during the quarter may have been recorded in the previous quarter. Data is collected from more than 3,000 counties nationwide, and those counties account for more than 99 percent of the U.S. population. ATTOM's report incorporates documents filed in all three phases of foreclosure: Default — Notice of Default (NOD) and Lis Pendens (LIS); Auction — Notice of Trustee Sale and Notice of Foreclosure Sale (NTS and NFS); and Real Estate Owned, or REO properties (that have been foreclosed on and repurchased by a bank). For the annual, midyear and quarterly reports, if more than one type of foreclosure document is received for a property during the timeframe, only the most recent filing is counted in the report. The annual, midyear, quarterly and monthly reports all check if the same type of document was filed against a property previously. If so, and if that previous filing occurred within the estimated foreclosure timeframe for the state where the property is located, the report does not count the property in the current year, quarter or month.

About ATTOM

ATTOM provides premium property data to power products that improve transparency, innovation, efficiency, and disruption in a data-driven economy. ATTOM multi-sources property tax, deed, mortgage, foreclosure, environmental risk, natural hazard, and neighborhood data for more than 155 million U.S. residential and commercial properties covering 99 percent of the nation's population. A rigorous data management process involving more than 20 steps validates, standardizes, and enhances the real estate data collected by ATTOM, assigning each property record with a persistent, unique ID — the ATTOM ID. The 30TB ATTOM Data Warehouse fuels innovation in many industries including mortgage, real estate, insurance, marketing, government and more through flexible data delivery solutions that include bulk file licenses, property data APIs, real estate market trends, property navigator and more. Also, introducing our newest innovative solution, that offers immediate access and streamlines data management – ATTOM Cloud.

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SOURCE ATTOM