Negative Equity

Felix Salmon points to this post on Calculated Risk on homeowners' negative equity. Key highlight:

CoreLogic reported today that more than 11.2 million, or 24 percent, of all residential properties with mortgages, were in negative equity at the end of the f irst quarter of 2010, down slightly from 11.3 million and 24 percent from the fourth quarter of 2009. An additional 2.3 million borrowers had less than five percent equity. Together, negative equity and near-negative equity mortgages accounted for over 28 percent of all residential properties with a mortgage nationwide.

In addition there are two noteworthy graphs. One shows negative equity by state. Fortunately, Pennsylvania is 48th. Finally, being near the bottom of the rankings is good. The second graph shows the distribution of negative equity. A rising proportion of such homes have more than 25% negative equity, a level at which it is hard to believe any rational person will not walk away. So more defaults may be imminent. And from the first graph we know that these are likely to be concentrated in a few states.