By DON FENLEY

TRI-CITIES, NE Tenn. – Home prices are still on a roller-coaster ride, and so is the local share of equity-rich homeowners.

Over half of the mortgaged properties in the Tri-Cities region had a loan-to-value ratio of 50% or lower during the second quarter, meaning the owner had at least 50% equity, according to Attom Data Solutions.

The dramatic increase of equity-rich properties illustrates the strength of the local housing market. It also shows how the local housing market has been a wealth-producing machine.

Local home prices have increased at a steady pace for the past seven years when the local market recovered from the Great Recession. Prices began appreciating at a rate of almost double the region’s historical average in 2018. They reached a crescendo in 2020 with an annual appreciation of 11.1% and last year with 17.6%. Given the current price growth rate, 2022 will be another double-digit yearly gain.

Attom’s latest analysis shows that virtually half of all mortgaged plays in the nation marked the ninth straight quarterly rise in the portion of homes with equity-rich status.

“After 124 consecutive months of home price increases, it’s no surprise that the percentage of equity-rich homes is the highest we’ve ever seen,” said Rick Sharga, executive vice president of market intelligence at ATTOM. “While home price appreciation appears to be slowing down due to higher interest rates on mortgage loans, it seems likely that homeowners will continue to build on the record amount of equity they have for the rest of 2022.”

Here’s how the Q2 equity-rich share looked for local counties included in Attom’s analysis compared to the equity-rich share during Q2 last year.

GREENE

57.5% up from 32.5%. The number of equity-rich properties was 6,213, up from 2,893 last year.

HAWKINS

55.9%, up from 29.7%. There were 4,466 equity-rich properties in Q2 compared to 2,429 last year.

SULLIVAN

53.7%, up from 32.6%. The number of equity-rich properties was 14,802 compared to 8,597 last year.

CARTER

52.5%, up from 29.8%. There were 3,571 equity-rich properties during Q2 this year compared to 1,938 last year.

UNICOI

51%, up from 27.6% last year. There were 1,523 equity-rich properties in Q2 compared to 794 last year.

WASHINGTON CO. TN

49.8%, up from 28.1% last year. The number of Q2 equity-rich properties was 13,188 compared to 7,444 last year.

WASHINGTON CO. VA

38%, up from 23.4% last year. There were 2,911 equity-rich properties in Q2 compared to 23.4% last year.

TRI-CITIES

54.7%, up from 31.7 last year. The number of equity-rich properties was 29,053 compared to 15,857 last year.

There were 53,141 mortgaged properties in the region during the second quarter of this year.

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Categories: REAL ESTATE