Foreclosure Rates Continue to Decline

The total U.S. loan delinquency rate for December was 4.42 percent, down 0.91 percent from November and down 7.49 percent from one year earlier, according to new data from Black Knight Financial Services (BKFS).

There were 59,700 foreclosure starts last month, a 1.16 percent drop from a month earlier and a 23.56 percent plummet from December 2015. There were 483,000 properties in foreclosure pre-sale inventory in December, a month-over-month decline by 15,000 and a year-over-year decline by 206,000.

During December, there were 2.7 million properties that were 30 or more days past due or in foreclosure, which is 30,000 lower than November’s level and 366,000 fewer than the level set in December 2015. Also in December, there were 2.2 million properties that are 30 or more days past due but not in foreclosure, which is 15,000 properties less than November and 160,000 fewer properties from one year ago.