ATTOM Data Solutions reveals drop in underwater homes
Almost 14.5 million US homes were equity rich in the third quarter of 2018 according to new figures from ATTOM Data Solutions.
The number of homes with combined loans secured by the property of 50% or less than its estimated market value, increased by 433,000 year-over-year.
Of all US homes with a mortgage, 27.5% were deemed equity rich in Q3 2018, up from 26.4% in Q3 2017.
"As homeowners stay put longer, they continue to build more equity in their homes despite the recent slowing in rates of home price appreciation," said Daren Blomquist, senior vice president with ATTOM Data Solutions. "West coast markets along with New York have the highest share of equity rich homeowners while markets in the Mississippi Valley and Rust Belt continue to have stubbornly high rates of seriously underwater homeowners when it comes to home equity."
Among 98 metropolitan statistical areas analyzed in the report, those with the highest share of equity rich properties were San Jose, California (73.9%); San Francisco, California (59.8%); Los Angeles, California (47.6%); Seattle, Washington (41.2%); and Honolulu, Hawaii (40.8%).
Seriously underwater homes up from a year ago
The number of homes seriously underwater – with estimated combined loans amounting to 25% or more of a home’s estimated market value – was 4.9 million. That’s 8.8% of all homes with a mortgage, down from 9.3% in the previous quarter but up from 8.7% in Q3 2017.
The top five zip codes with the highest share of seriously underwater properties were 08611 in Trenton, New Jersey (71.0% seriously underwater); 63137 in Saint Louis, Missouri (66.5%); 60426 in Harvey, Illinois (64.2%); 38106 in Memphis, Tennessee (60.7%); and 44105 in Cleveland, Ohio (59.2%).
