Booming real estate market creating massive well for homeowners. 
According to a report issued by CoreLogic, in the fourth quarter of 2021 41.9% of all mortgaged residential properties in the United States were designated as equity-rich. The designation indicates that the combined estimated amount of the loan balance on the properties was no more than 50% of the estimated market value. I know of no other time in the American economic history that so much value accrued within the homeowner market.
The basic forces driving this trend were the historic low mortgage rates, the shortage of available inventory for sale, and some of the biggest migrations from the North to the South due to the pandemic.
The state that reflected the largest increase in homeowners’ equity was Tennessee, which rose from 41.4% in the third quarter of 2021 to 47.2% in the fourth quarter of 2021. North Carolina and Nevada ran a close second and third with North Carolina climbing from 38.6% to 44.2% and Nevada jumping from 44.9% to 49.8% from the third quarter to the fourth quarter of 2021.
The accretive trendline continued from the report issued for the third quarter of 2021, which was 39.5% and up from 30.2% in the fourth quarter of 2020.
The only two states in which equity fell on mortgaged homes from the third quarter to the fourth quarter were Wyoming, which went down from 25.8% to 24.5% and Connecticut, which fell from 30.6% to 29.7% of homes equity rich.
Again, not all states enjoyed the huge boom in the real estate market as in some states, underwater homes rose from the 3rd to the 4th quarter of 2021: Wyoming increased from 11.5% to 14.3%, Connecticut increased from 3.8% to 4.3%, and Arizona increased from 1.3% to 1.4%.
The states that had the biggest declines in percentages of mortgaged homes seriously underwater from the third quarter of 2021 to the fourth quarter of 2021 were in the South and Midwest, according to the CoreLogic report. Mississippi reflected the biggest drop in homes seriously underwater, which fell from 17.7% to 12.2%; Maine fell from 5.8% to 4.4% and Iowa fell from 8.4% to 7%.
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