Nationally, 3.9% of mortgages were in some stage of delinquency in November 2019, representing a 0.1 percentage-point decline in the overall delinquency rate compared with November 2018, when it was 4%.
CoreLogic’s monthly Loan Performance Insights Report also showed that as of November 2019, the foreclosure inventory rate was 0.4%, which was unchanged from November 2018.
The November 2019 foreclosure inventory rate tied the prior 12 months as the lowest for any month since at least January 1999.
The rate for early-stage delinquencies – defined as 30 to 59 days past due – was 2% in November 2019, up from 1.9% in November 2018. The share of mortgages 60 to 89 days past due in October 2019 was 0.6%, down from 0.7% in November 2018. 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 remained consistent since April 2019, according to CoreLogic.
The share of mortgages that transitioned from current to 30 days past due was 1% in November 2019, up from 0.8% in November 2018. By comparison, in January 2007, just before the start of the financial crisis, the current-to-30-day transition rate was 1.2%, while it peaked at 2% in November 2008.
No states posted a year-over-year increase in the 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.
In November 2019, 50 metropolitan areas recorded at least a small annual increase in overall delinquency rate. The largest annual increases were in the following metros: Pine Bluff, Ark. (up 1.4 percentage points); Enid, Okla. (up 0.9 percentage points); Dalton, Ga. (up 0.6 percentage points); and Dubuque, Iowa (up 0.5 percentage points).
While the nation’s serious delinquency rate remains at a 14-year low, 23 metropolitan areas recorded small annual increases in their serious delinquency rates. Enid logged the highest annual gain (up 0.4 percentage points), followed by Dubuque (up 0.2 percentage points); Hanford-Corcoran, Calif. (up 0.2 percentage points); Panama City, Fla. (up 0.2 percentage points) and Salisbury, Maryland-Delaware (up 0.2 percentage points). The remaining 18 metro areas each logged an annual increase of 0.1 percentage point.
“Overall delinquency rates remain at 20-year low,s spurred on by tight underwriting standards following the onset of the Great Recession, a robust and accelerating economic cycle over the past five years and the increasing underlying health of the housing economy,” says Frank Martell, president and CEO of CoreLogic.
“In the Southeast, the 2018 hurricane season left higher overall delinquency rates in its wake, but the region is finally on the mend,” he adds. “In the Midwest, we see a somewhat different picture. Of the 50 metro areas that experienced increases in overall delinquency rates in November, nearly half were in the Midwest.”
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