Foreclosure Risk in New York State

This issue brief summarizes home foreclosure risk patterns across New York State, and updates our 2012 report, Foreclosures in New York: What’s Really Going On?, and 2014 brief, Foreclosure Risk in New York State.

Download the full brief.

New York State requires mortgage servicers to send pre-foreclosure notices to homeowners, at least 90 days before commencing a foreclosure action. New Economy Project analyzed pre-foreclosure notice data and found that, in 2017:

• Across New York State, mortgage servicers filed a total of 167,848 pre-foreclosure notices.
• Almost half of these notices were sent to homeowners in New York City (24.1%) and Long Island (24.6%). Foreclosure risk was also high in Buffalo, Rochester, and parts of the Hudson Valley; combined, homeowners in these areas received almost 30% of all pre-foreclosure notices.
• Nine of the ten zip codes with the highest number of pre-foreclosure notices are neighborhoods of color.
• Residents of New York City neighborhoods of color received pre-foreclosure notices more than twice as often as residents of other neighborhoods, controlling for the number of owner-occupied housing units.
• Thousands of New Yorkers of color continue to bear the brunt of the subprime lending crisis. Almost two-thirds (65.4%) of all pre-foreclosure notices sent to people in New York City neighborhoods of color concerned loans made between 2002 and 2007.

The report includes detailed maps of New York City and Long Island, and charts showing where foreclosure risk is most concentrated throughout New York State