30 Jun San Diego real estate market has fewer homes ‘underwater’

A new study by online real estate firm Zillow has found San Diego real estate has one of the lowest amounts of ‘underwater’  homes in the country.

Homeowners with homes ‘underwater’ typically owe more on the home than what it’s worth. That negative loan balance can easily cause homeowners to spiral into foreclosure — and was one of the reasons why housing markets crashed in 2008. In San Diego, only 8.6 percent of homes had negative equity in the first quarter of 2015 — or 39,812 homes. That compares to areas such as Phoenix, where one in five homes has negative equity.

San Diego ranked eighth in terms of negative equity, eclipsed by San Francisco, San Jose and Los Angeles. Nationally, negative equity dropped to 15.4 percent in the first quarter, down from 18.8 percent one year ago. At the peak of the housing crisis in 2008, more than 15 million homeowners in the U.S. had homes underwater.

San Diego real estate experts are concerned that homes with negative equity are mainly centered in lesser-priced areas, but experts are closely monitoring the negative equity rates to ensure that the amount of foreclosed homes in San Diego don’t increase.