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U.S. homeowners with mortgages saw their home equity increase 8.6% year-over-year during the fourth quarter of 2023, according to new data from CoreLogic. This represented a collective gain of $1.3 trillion and an average increase of slightly more than $24,000 per borrower from one year earlier.

Three Northeastern states posted the country’s highest annual equity gains in the fourth quarter: Rhode Island ($62,000), New Jersey ($55,000) and Massachusetts ($53,000). CoreLogic added the total net homeowner equity by the end of 2023 was more than $16.6 billion.

“Rising home prices continue to fuel growing home equity, which, at $298,000 per average borrower remained near historic highs at the end of 2023,” said Dr. Selma Hepp, Chief Economist for CoreLogic. “By extension, at 43%, the average loan-to-value ratio of U.S. borrowers has also remained in line with record lows, which suggests that the typical homeowner has notable home equity reserves that can be tapped if needed. More importantly, home price growth over the last year has helped lift the equity of homeowners who were underwater because of 2022 price declines – meaning that their mortgage amount was higher than the value of their properties.”

At the other end of the spectrum, the total number of mortgaged homes in negative equity decreased by 1.1% to 1 million homes, or 1.8% of all mortgaged properties. From the fourth quarter of 2022 to the fourth quarter of 2023, the total number of homes in negative equity decreased by 15%, from 1.2 million homes or 2.1% of all mortgaged properties.

“Slightly more than 1 million borrowers are underwater, the lowest number recorded in CoreLogic historic data and significantly below the 12 million seen coming out of the Great Recession,” added Hepp.