New Jersey Has Nation's Second-Highest Foreclosure Rate: New Data

NEW JERSEY — The Garden State had the second-highest foreclosure rate in the country in the beginning of 2022, according to property data gathered by ATTOM.

ATTOM is the parent company of RealtyTrac and released its Foreclosure Market Report for the first quarter of 2022.

In New Jersey, one in every 2,022 housing units had a foreclosure filing in Q1, data shows. The state with the highest rate of foreclosure filings was Illinois, with one in every 1,825 housing units.

In March alone, ATTOM shows 33,333 U.S. properties in foreclosure around the country.

This is an increase of 181 percent from a year ago. ATTOM says March 2022 is the 11th consecutive month "with a year-over-year increase in U.S. foreclosure activity."

Bank repossessions are at their highest numbers in two years, ATTOM said, but are "still well below normal levels."

Rick Sharga, executive vice-president of market intelligence for ATTOM, said foreclosure levels are returning to normal levels after the government's moratorium on evictions for foreclosed buyers expired.

“March foreclosure activity was at its highest level in exactly two years – since March 2020, when there were almost 47,000 foreclosure filings across the country,” Sharga said in a news release. “It’s likely that we’ll continue to see significant month-over-month and year-over-year growth through the second quarter of 2022, but still won’t reach historically normal levels of foreclosures until the end of the year at the earliest, unless the U.S. economy takes a significant turn for the worse.”