A new report on August delinquency and foreclosure data from the data and analytics division of Black Knight Financial Services finds that the U.S. delinquent inventory increased by 146,000 from July, while foreclosure starts declined for first time in five months, dropping 24 percent year-over-year. Foreclosure inventory is currently at its lowest level since March 2008.

The total U.S. loan delinquency rate (loans 30 or more days past due, but not in foreclosure) was 5.9 percent in August, up 4.68 percent from July and down 4.8 percent compared with August 2013.

The total U.S. foreclosure inventory rate was 1.8, down 2.8 percent from July and down 32.39 percent from August 2013. There were 81,600 total U.S. foreclosure starts last month, down 10.03 percent compared with July and down 24.16 percent compared with August 2013.

There were 2,995,000 total delinquent properties across the country in August, up 146,000 from July and down 129,000 from the same time last year. Of those, 1,143,000 were seriously delinquent, that is, 90 days or more past due. That number is down 7,000 from July and down 145,000 from the same time last year.

There were 913,000 properties in the foreclosure pre-sale inventory, down 22,000 from July and down 428,000 from the same time last year.

The top five states with the highest number of delinquent loans were Mississippi (14.58 percent), New Jersey (12.59 percent), Louisiana (11.37 percent), New York (11.1 percent) and Florida (10.98 percent).

The top five states with the highest number of seriously delinquent (90 or more days past due) loans were Mississippi (5.25 percent), Alabama (3.68 percent), Louisiana (3.49 percent), Rhode Island (3.49 percent) and Massachusetts, at 3.41 percent.