ATTOM: ‘Zombie’ Foreclosures Up to 3.1% Nationwide

ATTOM Data Solutions, Irvine, Calif., said 1.52 million U.S. single-family homes and condos in the United States were vacant in the first quarter, representing 1.5 percent of all homes.

The company’s Q1 Vacant Property and Zombie Foreclosure Report said 282,800 homes are in the process of foreclosure, with 8,700, or 3.1 percent, sitting empty as “zombie” foreclosures. The percentage is up from 3 percent in the fourth quarter, but still significantly less than 5.8 percent in first quarter 2014.

ATTOM said the total number of properties in the process of foreclosure in the first quarter fell by 1.9 percent from the fourth quarter, while the number of vacant foreclosures rose by 1.7 percent. Since 2016, the number facing possible foreclosure is down 27 percent, while the tally of unoccupied properties in the foreclosure pipeline has declined 53 percent.

“Homes abandoned by owners facing a possible foreclosure remain little more than a blip on the radar across the country, as one of the main scourges of the Great Recession continues to show little or no signs of re-emerging,” said Todd Teta, chief product officer with ATTOM Data Solutions. “Even with the slight increase in these so-called ‘zombie foreclosures,’ so far this year, there are still pockets of distress with elevated numbers of abandoned homes. But in yet another reflection of how the national housing market is still booming, you can drive through many towns and not pass a single such property.”

Other report findings:

–8,678 homes nationwide are sitting empty as zombie foreclosures in the first quarter. States withthe greatest zombie foreclosure rate included Ohio (6.8 percent), Indiana (5.1 percent), Illinois (4.7 percent), Oklahoma (4.5 percent) and Maryland (4.3 percent).

–New York continues to have the highest actual number of zombie properties (2,206), followed by Florida (1,390), Ohio (977), Illinois (943), Ohio (823) and Pennsylvania (317).

–Among metropolitan areas with at least 100,000 residential properties, Peoria, Ill., continues to have the highest percent of zombie foreclosures at 12.7 percent, followed by Cleveland, Ohio (10.5 percent); Youngstown, Ohio (9.1 percent); Syracuse, N.Y. (8.8 percent) and Knoxville, Tenn. (8.8 percent).

Lowest zombie foreclosure rates are in San Francisco, (0.5 percent); Austin, Texas (0.8 percent); Los Angeles (1.1 percent); Boston (1.3 percent) and Philadelphia (1.4 percent).

–Highest levels of vacant investor-owned homes are in Indiana (8.4 percent), Kansas (6.5 percent), Ohio, (6 percent), Minnesota (5.9 percent) and Tennessee (5.5 percent).

–Zombie foreclosures continue to represent just a fragment of the 1.52 million vacant homes nationwide, comprising just one in every 175 properties, or less than 1 percent.

–The highest overall vacancy rates for all residential properties continue to be in Tennessee (2.6 percent), Kansas (2.6 percent), Mississippi (2.5 percent), Oklahoma (2.5 percent) and Indiana (2.5 percent). The lowest remain in New Hampshire (0.4 percent), Vermont (0.4 percent), Delaware (0.5 percent), Idaho (0.6 percent) and North Dakota (0.7 percent).