from CoreLogic
— this post authored by MOLLY BOESEL
In November 2019, 3.9% of home mortgages were in some stage of delinquency [ 1], down from 4% a year earlier and the lowest for the month of November in more than 20 years, according to the latest CoreLogic Loan Performance Insights Report.
The measure, also known as the overall delinquency rate, includes all home loans 30 days or more past due, including those in foreclosure. For the month of November historically, the share of delinquent mortgages peaked in 2009 at 11.5%. Since March 2018, the overall delinquency rate each month has been lower than during the pre-crisis period of 2000 through 2006, when the rate averaged 4.7%.
The serious delinquency rate – defined as 90 days or more past due, including loans in foreclosure – was 1.3% in November 2019, down from 1.5% in November 2018. The serious delinquency rate has stood at 1.3% since April 2019. The foreclosure inventory rate – the share of mortgages in some stage of the foreclosure process – was 0.4% in November 2019, unchanged from a year earlier. November’s foreclosure rate was the lowest for that month in at least 20 years [2] and has stayed constant at 0.4% since November 2018. Rising home prices have led to record amounts of home equity, reducing the risk of foreclosure.
The share of mortgages that were 30 to 59 days past due – considered early-stage delinquencies – was 2% in November 2019, up from 1.9% in November 2018. The share of mortgages 60 to 89 days past due was 0.6% in November 2019, down from 0.7% in November 2018.
In addition to delinquency rates, CoreLogic tracks the rate at which mortgages transition from one stage of delinquency to the next, such as going from current to 30 days past due. Figure 1 shows that in November 2019 the current- to 30-day transition rate remained well below levels during the housing crisis. The November current- to 30-day rate was 1%, up from 0.8% a year earlier. The 30- to 60-day transition rate was 17.6% in November, up from 15.9% in November 2018, and the 60- to 90-day transition rate was 27.6% in November, up from 26.1% a year earlier.
Figure 2 shows the states with the highest and lowest share of mortgages 30 days or more delinquent. In November 2019, that rate was highest in Mississippi at 7.6% and the lowest in Oregon and Colorado at 1.9%. No states posted annual gains in their overall delinquency rate in November 2019. The states that logged the largest annual decreases included North Carolina (down 0.7 percentage points) and the District of Columbia (down 0.5 percentage points). Four other states followed with annual decreases of 0.4 percentage points.
Figure 3 shows the 30-plus-day past-due rate for November 2019 for 10 large metropolitan areas.[3] Miami had the highest rate of 5.4%. San Francisco had the lowest 30-plus-day delinquency rate in November 2019 at 1.2%. In all, 50 metropolitan areas recorded at least a small annual increase in the overall delinquency rate. The largest annual increases were in the following metros: Pine Bluff, Arkansas (up 1.4 percentage points); Enid, Oklahoma (up 0.9 percentage points); Dalton, Georgia (up 0.6 percentage points); and Dubuque, Iowa (up 0.5 percentage points). Metropolitan areas affected by the 2018 hurricanes saw large decreases in their overall delinquency rate. Panama City, Fla saw the largest decrease with a 7.5 percentage point decrease in the rate, followed by Jacksonville, N.C. (down 2.9 percentage points) and Wilmington, N.C. (down 2.7 percentage points).
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Footnotes
[1] Data in this report is provided by TrueStandings Servicing. https://www.corelogic.com/products/truestandings-servicing.aspx [2] The data in this report date back to January 1999. [3] Metropolitan areas used in this report are the ten most populous Metropolitan Statistical Areas. The report uses Metropolitan Divisions where available.Source
