Foreclosures continue to decrease on year-to-year basis

Foreclosure inventory was down 3.1 percent in September from August, according to Core Logic’s September 2016 National Foreclosures Report.

For nearly the past five years, year-over-year, foreclosures have been declining, and the trend continues. While the inventory was down, completed foreclosures saw a slight month-over-month rise of 5.2 percent.

“September’s serious delinquency rate dropped by 25 percent compared to a year earlier, the third consecutive monthly acceleration in the rate of decline. This improvement is continued evidence of the recovery in the housing market, especially given that the decreases were fairly uniform in most cities across the country,” said Frank Nothaft, the chief economist at CoreLogic.

In September 2015, there were 39,000 completed foreclosures, and only 36,000 in September 2016, representing a 7 percent decline year-over-year. The seriously delinquent rate is at 2.6, the lowest it has been since August 2007. The biggest drop is in homes in some stage of foreclosure, however. In September 2015, 493,000 homes were in some state of foreclosure, compared to 340,000 in September 2016. This is a decrease of 31.1 percent.

In September 2016, 0.9 percent of all homes with a mortgage were a part of the foreclosure inventory, down .4 from 1.3 percent in September 2015.

In Pennsylvania, 1.1 percent of homes were in a state of foreclosure in September 2016, slightly above the national average, however, overall, showing a decrease of 30.6 percent compared to September 2015. The commonwealth’s serious delinquency rate is 3.4 percent. Completed foreclosures from September 2015 to September 2016 were 19,275 in Pennsylvania.