The number of delinquent home loans in Sonoma County continues to increase, with one of every 13 homeowners falling behind more than 90 days on their mortgage payments in April.
The delinquency rate in April reached 7.5 percent, the highest rate in more than a year, according to data released Thursday by CoreLogic, formerly First American CoreLogic. A year earlier the rate was 5 percent, or one in every 20 home loans.
The county rates remain lower than the state and nation. California’s delinquency rate reached 11.6 percent in April, and the U.S. rate was 8.9 percent.
Experts have suggested that the growth in troubled loans remains tied to the large number of Americans who have lost their jobs.
The rate of county homes in some stage of foreclosure in April continued to hover at 1.9 percent. The rate was 1.7 percent in April 2009, but has been at or near 2 percent for half of the past year.
The foreclosure rate in April was 3.1 percent for California and 3.2 percent for the nation.
— Robert Digitale