from CoreLogic
— this post authored by MOLLY BOESEL
The amount of equity in mortgaged real estate increased by $1 trillion in Q1 2018 from Q1 2017, an annual increase of 13.3 percent, according to the latest CoreLogic Equity Report. Homeowner equity has more than doubled in five years, increasing by $4.4 trillion from Q1 2013 to Q1 2018 [ 1].
The nationwide negative equity share for Q1 2018 was 4.7 percent of all homes with a mortgage, more than 20 percentage points lower than the peak negative equity share – 26 percent – recorded in Q4 2009.[2] Over the past 12 months, 640,000 borrowers moved into positive equity.
The improvement in negative equity has been experienced across the country, with only two states registering a year-over-year increase in Q1 2018 (Wyoming saw a 0.1 percentage point increase and New York a 0.9 percentage point increases). Figure 1 shows the 25 states with the largest percentage-point decreases in the negative equity share from the previous year. Nevada’s 5.5-percentage-point decrease between Q1 2017 and Q1 2018 represented the nation’s largest year-over-year decline, and the drop from a high of 72.7 percent in Q1 2010 to 6.8 percent in Q1 2018 represented the largest decline from the peak.
Figure 2 shows the average dollar amount of negative equity and the negative equity share for 10 large Core Based Statistical Areas (CBSAs) in Q1 2018. The average amount of negative equity is inversely related to the negative equity share. For example, in this group of CBSAs, San Francisco has the largest average amount of negative equity, but the negative equity share is only 0.6 percent. Miami has the smallest average amount of negative equity, but has a negative equity share that is nearly three times the national average.
