OK, so we’re not in The Walking Dead territory yet.
That much was made clear the past week when ATTOM released its fourth-quarter Vacant Property and Zombie Foreclosure Report. According to ATTOM, 1.3 million (1,264,241) residential properties in the U.S. sit vacant, or 1 in 79 homes.
However, ATTOM’s report showed that 284,423 residential properties are in the process of foreclosure in the fourth quarter, up 5.2 percent from the third quarter, and 27.4 percent more than Q4 of 2021.
Of the pre-foreclosure properties, 7,722 are zombie foreclosures or abandoned homes. That’s an increase of 0.2 percent from Q3 and 3.9 percent more than Q4 of 2021.
The Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington metro area had only 13 pre-foreclosure, or zombie, properties and a 0.88 percent rate in Q4 of 2022.
In Q4 2022, Texas had 114 pre-foreclosure properties, eight fewer than the third quarter. The Q4 rate was 1.8 percent as compared to 2.34 percent in the previous quarter.
By county, Dallas had six zombie properties, Tarrant five, and Collin zero.
The report analyzed publicly recorded real estate data — including foreclosure status, equity, and owner-occupancy status — collected by ATTOM and matched against monthly updated vacancy data.
The count of zombie properties has increased in each of the past three quarters. That aligns with The Walking Dead in which the number of zombies left to eliminate doesn’t seem to abate.
In the case of zombie foreclosure numbers up slightly but remaining tiny, the trend reflects one of many high points from a housing market that has seen 11 years of nearly uninterrupted gains.
Median home values nationwide have more than doubled since 2012, home-seller profits have increased over 50 percent and the vast majority of homeowners have equity built up in their homes.
“Low vacancy rates are also a major factor in there being few zombie homes,” Rick Sharga, executive vice president of market intelligence at ATTOM, said in the report.
“And with demand from both traditional homebuyers and investors still relatively strong, and the inventory of homes for sale still very low, vacancy rates for residential homes is about as low as it’s ever been.”
