Many loans would have been foreclosed if not for federal government protections enacted during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a new report from Attom Data Solutions.
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After more than a decade of declines that sent foreclosure activity to a historic low point, the number of properties at some point in the foreclosure process is on the rise this year.
There have been a total of 164,581 properties with either a default notice, a scheduled auction or under a bank repossession, according to a report from Attom Data Solutions released Thursday.
The nation is on track for its first annual increase of foreclosed properties since 2010, a year that marked the beginning of a long downward trend that appears to have bottomed out last year.
“Foreclosure activity across the United States continued its slow, steady climb back to pre-pandemic levels in the first half of 2022,” said Rick Sharga, executive vice president of market intelligence at Attom. “While overall foreclosure activity is still running significantly below historic averages, the dramatic increase in foreclosure starts suggests that we may be back to normal levels by sometime in early 2023.”
During the first six months of 2010 there were foreclosure filings on 1.6 million properties nationwide. In 2021, there were just over 65,000 during that time, according to Attom.
Congress enacted a foreclosure moratorium in the early days of the pandemic, preventing foreclosure activity on federally backed mortgages. The…