Foreclosure activity sinks to a five-year low

Foreclosure activity in the U.S. fell last month to its lowest level since the start of the credit crisis in 2007, driven largely by drops in states such as California, where the process occurs outside of the courtroom.

Foreclosure filings – default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions – were logged on 18,780 homes, according to RealtyTrac. That was a drop of 5% from the prior month and a 14% decline from April 2011. One in every 698 U.S. housing units had a foreclosure filing during the month.

States where a court order is not needed to take back a home appear to be bouncing back faster than those that need one. The Times wrote about the distinction between judicial and non-judicial foreclosure states in this 2010 article.

The so-called non-judicial states such as California, Arizona and Nevada collectively posted a 7% decline in foreclosure activity last month from the prior month and a 29% drop from the same month last year.

In states where a court order is needed to take back a home, states such as Florida, New York and New Jersey, foreclosure activity dropped 3% from the prior month but was up 15% from the same month a year earlier.

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