Number of vacant properties continues to decrease

Around 1.6 percent, or 1.4 million, residential properties in the United States were vacant at the end of the third quarter of 2016, marking a 3 percent decrease from the second quarter, and a 9 percent decrease compared to the third quarter of 2015.

According to ATTOM Data Solutions, 18,304 properties that are in foreclosure are vacant (also known as zombie foreclosures). This is nearly 5 percent of all residential properties in foreclosure,however, it is a decrease of 5 percent from the second quarter of 2016, and a 9 percent decrease from this time last year. Yet bank-owned, or REO, residential properties saw an increase of 7 percent from the second quarter of 2016, and a 67 percent increase from this time last year. There are 46,604 of these properties.

“A strong seller’s market along with political pressure has likely motivated lenders to complete the foreclosure process over the past year on many vacant properties that were lingering in foreclosure limbo for years,” said Daren Blomquist, senior vice president at ATTOM Data Solutions. “While that has reduced the number of vacant properties in the foreclosure process — so-called zombie foreclosures — it has also resulted in a corresponding rise in the number of vacant bank-owned homes. Assuming that the foreclosing lenders are maintaining these properties and paying the property taxes, they pose less of a threat to neighborhood quality than zombie foreclosures, but they still represent latent inventory in an inventory-starved housing market.”

Philadelphia was named one of the metros with the most vacant REOs (1,737).  Philadelphia also had one of the highest number of zombie foreclosures with 1,525.