Zillow reports local rate of 33.9 percent is still above national rate.
The share of San Diego homeowners who are underwater on their mortgages has fallen, but the local rate is still higher than the nation’s, according to a report by real estate website Zillow released Thursday.
More than one-third of local borrowers — 33.9 percent — owed more on their homes than their properties are worth in the second quarter (April to June,) down from 35.6 percent in the first quarter.
The national rate also fell. The share of borrowers with negative equity was 30.9 percent in the second quarter, down from 31.4 percent in the first quarter.
Zillow’s economist Stan Humphries points to rising home prices as the reason for the drop in the underwater borrowers. San Diego home prices are at a four-year high, DataQuick numbers show.
San Diego has a lower negative-equity rate than Las Vegas, Atlanta, Orlando, Phoenix and Riverside, areas that topped Zillow’s 30-city rankings for the second quarter.
Zillow, an online real estate information company, used loan data from TransUnion to draw its conclusions.
Written by
Lily Leung
