Completed foreclosures nationwide fell during the month of November, dropping 23 percent on a year-over-year basis, according to CoreLogic.
According to the National Foreclosure Report, there were 55,000 foreclosures completed nationwide in November, compared with 72,000 in November 2011.
"The continued fall in completed foreclosures is a positive supply-side contribution in many regions of the U.S.," Anand Nallathambi, president and CEO of CoreLogic, said in a statement. "We still have a long way to go to return to historic norms, but this trend is firmly in the right direction."
Approximately 1.2 million homes, or 3.0 percent of all homes with a mortgage, were in the national foreclosure inventory as of November 2012 compared to 1.5 million, or 3.5 percent, in November 2011. Year-over-year, the foreclosure inventory was down 18 percent.
According to CoreLogic’s data, about 2 percent of Massachusetts homes were in foreclosure, putting it around 28th in the nation.
As a basis of comparison, prior to the decline in the housing market in 2007, completed foreclosures averaged 21,000 per month between 2000 and 2006. Completed foreclosures are an indication of the total number of homes actually lost to foreclosure. Since the financial crisis began in September 2008, there have been approximately 4 million completed foreclosures across the country.
"The pace of completed foreclosures has significantly improved over a year ago as short sales gain popularity as a disposition method," Mark Fleming, chief economist for CoreLogic, said in the statement. "Additionally, the inventory of foreclosed properties continues to decline while the housing market demonstrates an ongoing ability to absorb the distressed sales that result from completed foreclosures."
The five states with the highest number of completed foreclosures for the 12 months ending in November 2012 were California, Florida, Michigan, Texas and Georgia. These states account for 50 percent of all completed foreclosures nationwide.
The five states with the lowest number of completed foreclosures for the 12 months ending in November were South Dakota, District of Columbia, Hawaii, North Dakota and Maine.
