There were roughly 1.3 million vacant residential properties, representing 1.27% or one in 78 homes in the U.S., during the fourth quarter of this year according to new data from ATTOM.
The fourth quarter data is virtually the same as in the third quarter of this year. ATTOM also found 320,765 residential properties are in the process of foreclosure in the fourth quarter of this year, up 1.7% from the third quarter of 2023 and up 12.8% from the fourth quarter of 2022.
Among those pre-foreclosure properties, about 8,900 sit vacant as zombie foreclosures (pre-foreclosure properties abandoned by owners) in the fourth quarter of 2023. That figure also is up by 1.4% from the prior quarter and up 15.3% percent from a year ago. The latest increase marks the seventh straight quarterly rise. Nonetheless, the share of zombie properties represents one of every 11,412 homes.
While most neighborhoods have few or no zombie foreclosures, the biggest increases from the third quarter of 2023 to the fourth quarter of 2023 in states with at least 50 zombie properties are in Kentucky (zombie properties up 15%, from 53 to 61), Connecticut (up 15%, from 87 to 100), Maryland (up 13%, from 229 to 258), Texas (up 13%, from 112 to 126) and California (up 12%, from 244 to 274). New York had the highest ratio of zombie homes to all residential properties during the quarter (one of every 2,115 homes), followed by Ohio (one in 3,690), Illinois (one in 4,338), Iowa (one in 4,380) and Indiana (one in 6,114).
On the flipside, the largest quarterly decreases among states with at least 50 zombie foreclosures are in New Mexico (zombie properties down 15%, from 95 to 81), New Jersey (down 8%, from 205 to 188), Maine (down 7%, from 56 to 52), Nevada (down 7%, from 99 to 92) and Georgia (down 4%, from 85 to 82).
“The ongoing strength of the U.S. housing market continues to benefit neighborhoods around the country in so many ways, with the near-total lack of zombie foreclosures standing out as one striking example,” said Rob Barber, CEO for ATTOM. “Rising equity flowing from rising home values has not only kept foreclosure cases from spiking since the moratorium was lifted. It also keeps giving delinquent homeowners a valuable resource they can use to either stave off eviction or sell their homes and move on. As a result, we continue to see none of the widespread abandonment that followed the housing market crash after the Great Recession of the late 2000s.”
Photo via Cinema-Crazed.com
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