Key Takeaways
- More than 47% of homeowners in 2024 were “equity rich,” meaning borrowers owed less than half of the value of the home, remaining near record high levels, while 95% of homeowners hold some level of equity in their property.
- Rising home prices have increased home equity and are highest in Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine.
- On the flip side, just 2.5% of homeowners were underwater on their property.
With home prices moving steadily higher, Americans maintained near-historically high levels of equity in their homes in 2024, according to a report from real estate data firm ATTOM.
The report showed that 47.7% of homeowners were considered “equity rich” in the fourth quarter of 2024, meaning borrowers’ home loan balance was no more than half of the home’s total value.
While that’s off a tick from the recent peak in the second quarter, the share of equity-rich homes remains near record levels. In 2020, only 26.5% of homes were considered equity-rich. Moreover, the report showed that 95% of homeowners had some level of equity built up in their properties.
“Nearly half of all residential mortgage payers in the U.S. have paid off at least half their loans, leaving many with six-figure levels of wealth available to leverage anything from new home purchases to starting new businesses to paying off major expenses,” said ATTOM CEO Rob Barber.
High Prices Pushing Home Equity Gains
Barber said that historically high equity levels were partly the result of “endless increases” in home values over more than a decade. High prices have contributed to affordability issues in the housing market, which have pushed the number of sales lower.
Census Bureau data backed this trend with the median sales price of new homes jumping more than 40% over the past 10 years, moving up to $420,100 in 2024 from $294,200 in 2015. The median price for existing homes also hit a record high of $407,500 in 2024.
The ATTOM data showed that homeowners in Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine had the highest levels of home equity, while Louisiana, Alaska, and North Dakota had the lowest percentage of equity-rich homes. Cities with the highest levels of home equity included San Jose and Los Angeles in California, along with Portland, Maine.
At the same time, houses considered to be “underwater,” where the loan on a property was at least 25% higher than the total value, remained at 2.5%.
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