While homeowner-vacated zombie foreclosures are improving across the country, they still remain, and are getting worse, in some top-foreclosure states like New Jersey and New York.
According to RealtyTrac’s latest zombie foreclosure report, homeowner-vacated zombie foreclosures nationwide are down 10% from a year ago to 127,021 as of the end of the second quarter. This is down 11% from the previous quarter and down 10% from second quarter 2014.
Zombie foreclosures represented about one in five of the 527,047 U.S. properties in foreclosure. Also, one in every 1,040 U.S. housing units is an owner-vacated zombie foreclosure.
Here comes the not-so-positive half. Zombie foreclosure are still up from a year ago in half of U.S. metros, increasing in 91 of the 183 metropolitan statistical areas analyzed in the report.
Top markets where zombie foreclosures increased from a year ago include: New York (up 38%), Los Angeles (up 39%), Houston (up 38%), Philadelphia (up 19%) and Boston (up 14%).
On the other side, major markets where the number of zombies decreased from a year ago included Chicago (down 28%), Dallas (down 27%), Miami (down 46%), Atlanta (down 33%), and Phoenix (down 14%).
For a more visually appealing view of the data, check out the infographic below.
Click to enlarge
Source: RealtyTrac
