The last time mortgage delinquency was this low was at the height of the financial crisis. The outlook is for the delinquency rate to fall further by the end of the year.
The 60-day rate of delinquency on residential loans was 4.56 percent in the first quarter.
It was the lowest rate of delinquency for mortgages since the third-quarter 2008, when the late payment rate was 3.96 percent.
First-quarter delinquency was a 63-basis-point improvement from the past-due rate as of the fourth quarter of last year.
Compared to the first-quarter 2012, the rate of 60-day delinquency has fallen 122 basis points based on the statistics supplied by TransUnion.
The findings were drawn from 27 million anonymous consumer records randomly sampled from TransUnion’s national consumer credit database.
“Both on a year-over-year and quarter-over-quarter basis, this is the best improvement in mortgage delinquency since TransUnion began observing the data point in 1992,” the Chicago-based firm reported.
The data provider said it expects delinquency to continue the improving trend during the current quarter and finish 2013 at 4.5 percent.
Florida had a higher rate of delinquency than any other state: 11.00 percent.
Nevada was next with a 9.12 percent rate, then 6.93 percent in New Jersey and 6.27 percent in Delaware.
North Dakota’s 1.37 percent 60-day rate was lower than any other state.
Arizona’s 260-basis-point decline from a year earlier gave it the best improvement of any state.
The average loan amount in the District of Columbia was $376,121 — more than any state. West Virginia’s $103,054 was the lowest mortgage debt per borrower.
