Improving home prices push distressed sales to 7-year low

The share of distressed sales in December reached a seven-year low and is inching closer to the pre-financial crisis share of 2%.

The share of distressed sales in December reached a seven-year low, according to the latest data from CoreLogic.
 
The data reported distressed sales (REO and short sales) accounted for 12.8% of total home sales nationally in December 2014, a 2.8 percentage point decrease from December 2013, and a 1.2 percentage point decrease from November 2014.
 
The distressed sales share in December 2014 was at its lowest percentage since December 2007. REO made up 8.8% of total home sales in December, and short sales were 4%. Distressed sales totaled 32.4%of all sales in January 2009 (with REO sales making up 28% of 32.4%).
 
“The ongoing shift away from REO sales is a driver of improving home prices, as REOs typically sell at a larger discount than do short sales,” Corelogic reported. “There will always be some amount of distress in the housing market, so one would never expect a 0% distressed sales share.”
 
Pre-financial crisis the share of distressed sales was about 2%, according to CoreLogic.
 
In December 2014, Michigan had the largest percentage of distressed sales of any state in the U.S. (23.6%). Florida followed with 22.4%, then Illinois with 20.8%, Maryland with 18.7% and Connecticut with 18.6%.
 
Nevada experienced the largest percentage point drop in distressed sales from the previous year (9.6 percentage point decrease). California had the largest improvement, falling to 56.9% from its peak in January 2009 of 67.4%.
 
Based on population, Miami-Miami Beach-Kendall, Florida had the largest amount of distressed sales (24.7%).  Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, California, had the largest year-over-year drop in its distressed share, decreasing from 24.6%in December 2013 to 13.8% in December 2014.