Arkansas foreclosures among lowest in U.S.

by Paul Gatling ([email protected]) 1,600 views 

California-based Attom Data Solutions, which tracks national housing and foreclosure data, recently released its October 2021 U.S. Foreclosure Market Report.

It showed there were 66 Arkansas properties with foreclosure filings in October, one for every 20,762 housing units in the state. That’s down 10% from September and 7% from a year ago, according to the report.

That’s also one of the lowest rates in the U.S. and ranks Arkansas No. 42.

A home goes into the foreclosure process when the owner can’t pay the mortgage. Banks begin the foreclosure process by filing a notice of a foreclosure hearing that will decide whether a home is sold at auction. A home is considered “distressed” when it’s under any stage of foreclosure.

There were 20,587 U.S. properties with foreclosure filings in October, up 5% from September and 76% from a year ago.

“As expected, now that the moratorium has been over for three months, foreclosure activity continues to increase,” RealtyTrac executive vice president  Rick Sharga said in a news release. RealtyTrac is an Attom company. “But it’s increasing at a slower rate, and it appears that most of the activity is primarily on vacant and abandoned properties, or loans that were in foreclosure prior to the pandemic.”

States with the highest foreclosure rates in October were Illinois (one in every 1,923 housing units had a foreclosure filing), Florida (one in every 3,180) and New Jersey (one in every 3,438). West Virginia (one in every 81,707), Oregon (one in every 73,704) and South Dakota (one in every 64,762) were the lowest.

Among metro areas analyzed with a population of at least 200,000, the highest foreclosure rates were St. Louis (one in every 1,138), Trenton, N.J. (one in every 1,293) and Miami (one in every 2,233).

Among Arkansas metros in the report, Fort Smith and Northwest Arkansas have two of the lowest foreclosure rates in the country. Fort Smith (one in every 41,680) ranks No. 209 out of the top 220 regions. Northwest Arkansas (one in every 43,362) ranks No. 210.

The central Arkansas metro ranks No. 138 with one in every 10,161 housing unit in foreclosure in October.