Zombie foreclosures continue to represent a mere sliver of all residential properties undergoing foreclosure proceedings, according to ATTOM’s first-quarter 2025 Vacant Property and Zombie Foreclosure Report.
As of February, only about 1.4 million (1,372,396) residential properties – or 1.3% of all homes in the nation – were sitting vacant. That’s flat compared with the fourth quarter of last year and up slightly from a year ago.
And only one in about 14,700 U.S. homes was sitting vacant during foreclosure, which is near the five-year low.
The report analyzes publicly recorded real estate data collected by ATTOM — including foreclosure status, equity and owner-occupancy status — matched against monthly updated vacancy data.
The report shows that 212,268 residential properties in the U.S. are in the process of foreclosure in the first quarter of this year, down 1.5% from the fourth quarter and down 12.6% from the first quarter of 2024.
Foreclosure activity has decreased for five consecutive quarters following a surge in cases that occurred after the nationwide moratorium on lenders pursuing delinquent homeowners—implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic—was lifted in mid-2021.
Of those pre-foreclosure properties, 7,094 sit vacant as zombie foreclosures (pre-foreclosure properties abandoned by owners). That figure is virtually flat compared with the fourth quarter, but down 3.3% from a year ago.
“You’d have to take a very long walk through most U.S. communities to come across even one zombie foreclosure—and even then, you might not find any,” says Rob Barber, CEO of ATTOM, in a statement. “This marks a significant turnaround from the period following the Great Recession in the late 2000s, when a collapsing housing market and abandoned properties posed serious risks to many neighborhoods. The latest figures highlight one of the many benefits of the nation’s prolonged housing market boom for both homeowners and renters alike.”
“We have every reason to believe this will continue into the foreseeable future, given high levels of equity flowing from rising home prices and historically low supplies of homes for sale that make the few abandoned properties out there more likely to be snapped up by buyers,” Barber adds.
Photo: Jackson Simmer
