Nebraska has one of the lowest foreclosure rates in the nation. Somebody should tell the headline writers. PART TWO
Yes I have AI assist!
Welcome back. In Part One we established that today’s interest rate is roughly the forty-year average. Today we handle the sequel every doom-scroller is waiting for: the foreclosure tsunami that is always, perpetually, six months away.
It is not coming. I have the numbers, and I have the memory to go with them.
The number that actually measures distress
The Mortgage Bankers Association has surveyed lenders every quarter since 1979. The figure that matters is the foreclosure inventory rate: the share of all mortgages that are actually in the foreclosure process at a given moment.
- Long-run average (1979 onward): about 1.5 percent of all loans
- The 2010 peak, the worst in modern history: 4.64 percent
- Second quarter of 2026: 0.67 percent
Let me translate. Today’s foreclosure rate is less than half the historical average and roughly one-seventh of the 2010 peak. Foreclosure starts in the second quarter were 0.20 percent of loans — two in every thousand. Yes, that is up from a year ago. It is also still a fraction of normal.
Forty years in four acts
| Era |
What happened |
Why |
| Mid-1980s |
Regional foreclosure surges in the Farm Belt and the oil states |
The farm crisis — anyone who grew up in Nebraska needs no further explanation — and the collapse of oil prices in Texas and Oklahoma |
| Early 1990s |
A national recession and the savings-and-loan cleanup |
Foreclosure inventory hovered near one percent; it felt severe and it was ordinary |
| 2007–2012 |
The Great Recession: nearly 2.9 million properties with a foreclosure filing in 2010 alone, 2.23 percent of every housing unit in America |
Liar loans, zero-down subprime, adjustable rates that exploded, and appraisals that were fiction |
| 2020–2026 |
Pandemic moratoriums drove filings to an all-time low of 0.11 percent in 2021; they have been climbing back toward normal ever since |
Forbearance ended, and a market that was artificially frozen is thawing — that is all a “32 percent increase” means when the starting point is nearly zero |
The receipts, year by year
- 2010: roughly 2.87 million foreclosure filings. The peak. The real thing.
- 2019: about 493,000 filings, 0.36 percent of housing units — the last normal year before the pandemic.
- 2021: 0.11 percent, the lowest on record, because the government paused nearly everything.
- 2025: 367,460 filings. That is 87 percent below the 2010 peak and still below 2019.
- First half of 2026: 227,548 filings nationwide, 0.16 percent of housing units. For perspective, the single month of December 2009 produced roughly 350,000.
- August 2026, the latest monthly report: 40,277 filings nationwide, one in every 3,569 housing units. That is up 13 percent from a year earlier, and it is still a rounding error next to 2010.
And Nebraska? Across the first half of 2026, our state recorded 636 foreclosure filings, one for every 1,358 housing units. The national figure was one in every 632. We ran at roughly half the national rate, in a state where the national rate is itself historically low. August was a louder month here: 195 filings, one in every 4,428 housing units, against a national one in every 3,569. That is a large percentage jump on a very small base, and I address it below, because you deserve the whole number and not the flattering half.
Why 2008 is not repeating
I was not working in this industry as a realtor through 2008. But I was in finance and watched good people lose homes to loans that should never have been written. That market was built on adjustable-rate mortgages that reset into payments nobody could make, on stated-income applications nobody verified, and on buyers with no equity on day one.
Today the overwhelming majority of homeowners carry fixed-rate loans. Many of them locked in rates under four percent and are sitting on years of appreciation. A homeowner with equity does not foreclose; a homeowner with equity sells. The structural conditions that produced 2010 do not exist, and no amount of dramatic music over stock footage of a “For Sale” sign changes that.
Where I will be honest with you
There is genuine stress in one corner of the market: FHA and VA borrowers, who tend to have smaller down payments and thinner reserves. The MBA reported FHA foreclosure inventory at its highest level since 2018 earlier this year. That is real, it deserves attention, and it is precisely the kind of detail the headlines flatten into “FORECLOSURES SURGE.” A rising number in a small, specific segment is not a national wave. It is a reason to call someone who knows the difference.
Two more figures I watch rather than ignore. Nationally, completed foreclosures, the homes a bank actually took back, were up 42 percent in August from a year earlier; the pipeline that was frozen during the pandemic is finally emptying, and those are real families. And here at home, Nebraska’s August filings were up sharply from August 2025. On a base of 195 filings in a state with more than 860,000 housing units, a big percentage is a small number. It is still a number. If your household is in it, or near it, the time to call me is before the lender calls you.
Questions you should be asking — and calling me with
- If foreclosures are so low, why do I keep seeing “distressed property” ads, and are any of those deals real?
- I have equity but my payment is becoming difficult. What are my options before a lender ever enters the picture?
- I am a veteran with a VA loan and I am behind. Who do I call, and what protections do I have that the general public does not?
- Is now a good time to buy a foreclosure or a short sale in Omaha, or is that a 2010 strategy in a 2026 market?
- My neighbor’s home went into foreclosure. What does that do to my value, and what does it not do?
I have walked clients through every one of these, on both sides of the river. Call or text me at 402-215-1529, visit thehomegirlne.com, or find me on Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn. I know people, I gotta guy, and nobody on cable news is going to return your call.
Keeping it real estate,
The Home Girl
Angela Peters, The Home Girl, is a licensed REALTOR® with Realty ONE Group Sterling, serving Nebraska and Iowa. I am not a lender or an attorney, and nothing here is financial, tax, or legal advice. Rate and market figures are drawn from publicly available sources, including Freddie Mac, the Mortgage Bankers Association, ATTOM, and the Federal Reserve, as of the date of publication, and will change. If you are behind on your mortgage, contact your servicer and a HUD-approved housing counselor promptly; foreclosure timelines and protections vary by state and loan type. I know people, and I gotta guy for that, too.