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The latest Special Housing Risk Report from ATTOM has determined California and New Jersey had high concentrations of counties considered most at-risk during the first quarter.

The report identified risk by affordability, proportion of seriously underwater mortgages, foreclosures, and unemployment rates. Counties were considered more or less at risk based on the percentage of homes facing possible foreclosure, the portion with seriously underwater mortgages, the percentage of average local wages required to pay for major home ownership expenses on median-priced single-family homes, and local unemployment rates.

In 109 of the counties ATTOM analyzed, a typical resident would have to spend more than half of their annual income to cover the down payment, mortgage, and other initial expenses for a median-priced home. The new report found nearly half of the 50 most at-risk markets were either in California (14) and New Jersey (9). On the flip side, more than half (27) of the 50 least at-risk counties in the analysis were in Southern states, followed by 12 from Midwestern states and seven from states in the Northeast.

“This report highlights a number of market forces that anyone with an interest in their local housing market should keep an eye on,” said Rob Barber, CEO at ATTOM. “Affordability is an obvious concern, but as the data shows, there’s a complex interplay between price, wages, mortgage health, and foreclosure rates that can give even greater insight into where property values are likely to go in the future. There’s no unequivocal metric that can tell you where it’s safe to buy and where it’s risky. But taken together these data points show how different parts of the country are performing.”