The 2026 Michigan Foreclosure Risk Index
Where financial pressure on Michigan homeowners is building, county by county
Published on July 26th, 2026, by John Carter | Founder, NestCashOriginal NestCash research, free to read and cite. If you need to sell a house fast in Michigan, start here.
Abstract
Michigan’s foreclosure story is one of recovery. The state that led the nation into the last housing crisis is now firmly in the middle of the pack. Michigan recorded 6,318 foreclosure filings in the first half of 2026, up about 4 percent from the same period a year earlier, which places it 23rd of 51 in the country by foreclosure rate. That works out to roughly one filing for every 732 housing units, or 0.14 percent, a hair below the national figure of one in 632. The number worth holding onto is the comparison to Michigan’s own past. At the peak of the last crisis in 2010, the state recorded about 135,874 filings, one for every 33 homes, the fifth-largest total in the country and among the worst rates anywhere. Today’s activity runs more than 90 percent below that peak. One distinction matters before the numbers do any work: a filing marks the start of the legal process, not a completed foreclosure or a home already lost, and most filings are resolved before anyone loses a house. To find where the pressure that remains is concentrated, we built the Michigan Foreclosure Risk Index, a county-level measure that combines market softness, mortgage cost burden, mortgage delinquency, and unemployment into a single score from 0 to 100. The pattern it reveals runs against intuition. The strain is not in booming West Michigan or the affluent suburbs north of Detroit. It sits in the rural counties of the northern Lower Peninsula, in pockets of the Upper Peninsula, and in the old industrial core around Detroit, Flint, and Saginaw, where Wayne County stands out as both a high-risk and a high-volume county at once.
We score all eighty-three counties from 0 to 100 by blending four public signals, each weighted by how directly it bears on a mortgaged homeowner: market softness (35 percent), mortgage cost burden (30 percent), 90-day mortgage delinquency (20 percent), and unemployment (15 percent). Each signal is min-max normalized within Michigan, so the score ranks counties against one another in the state, not against a national or absolute standard. The full weighting, the normalization, and the grade bands are spelled out in the methodology section below.
Key findings
- Michigan has healed from the epicenter of the last crisis. First-half 2026 filings totaled 6,318, up 4.3 percent year over year (ATTOM Data Solutions). At about one in every 732 housing units the state ranks 23rd nationally, and today’s activity runs more than 90 percent below the roughly 135,874 filings, one in 33 homes, that Michigan recorded at its 2010 peak.
- The pressure is rural, plus the old industrial core. Twenty-four counties land in the Elevated tier of our index, led by rural counties of the northern Lower Peninsula, Lake (70.0), Oscoda (68.1), Clare (66.3), and Alger (65.2) in the Upper Peninsula. The one large metro among them is Wayne County (63.4), home to Detroit.
- Wayne County is both high-risk and high-volume, a rare double. Detroit’s county is the fifth-riskiest of all eighty-three and, with nearly 800,000 housing units, by far the largest. It carries the highest serious delinquency rate of any Michigan county at 1.1 percent, and Detroit ranked second in the nation for bank repossessions in May 2026.
- Booming West Michigan is the safest place in the state. Ottawa County scores 16.7, the lowest in Michigan, and Grand Rapids’ Kent County (24.2), Ann Arbor’s Washtenaw County (22.5), and the Detroit-orbit suburbs of Oakland (29.3) and Livingston (27.1) all grade Lower.
- Delinquency is low but turning. Michigan’s serious mortgage delinquency rate (90 or more days past due) sat at 0.7 percent in September 2025, up from 0.5 percent in early 2024 (CFPB). Wayne County runs hottest at 1.1 percent, followed by the Flint and Muskegon areas.
Methodology
Data and sources
We built the index entirely from public and openly licensed data, and we cite each source at the point of use. Market conditions come from Realtor.com Economic Research (county listing data through June 2026). Housing tenure, mortgage status, cost burden, and county housing counts come from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey five-year estimates. Mortgage delinquency comes from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s Mortgage Performance Trends (latest data September 2025). Statewide and historical foreclosure trends come from ATTOM Data Solutions’ published foreclosure market reports and RealtyTrac’s year-end reports. Every dataset we used is free and publicly available, and every figure in this report traces back to one of the sources above.
Building the index
The Michigan Foreclosure Risk Index is a weighted blend of four signals, each chosen because it precedes or predicts foreclosure among homeowners who carry a mortgage:
35%
The share of active listings with a price cut and the median days a home sits on the market. A soft market matters because a homeowner in trouble who cannot sell quickly has fewer ways to avoid foreclosure.
30%
The share of owners with a mortgage who spend more than 30 percent of household income on housing. This is direct payment stress on the exact population that can be foreclosed on.
20%
The 90-day-or-more delinquency rate, the clearest early warning that foreclosures are coming.
15%
A secondary driver. We hold its weight down deliberately, because unemployment also captures renters and therefore dilutes a signal meant to describe homeowners.
We normalized each signal across the eighty-three counties on a 0-to-1 scale, where 0 is the lowest value in Michigan and 1 is the highest, then applied the weights above and multiplied by 100. The result is a relative score: it ranks counties against one another within Michigan, not against a national or absolute standard. We then graded each county by its score, Elevated for a score of 50 or above, Moderate for 44 to 49.9, and Lower for anything below 44. Twenty-four counties land in the Elevated tier, sixteen in Moderate, and forty-three in Lower.
Limitations
Three limits are worth stating plainly. First, the index is relative. A Lower grade means lower risk than other Michigan counties, not low risk in absolute terms, and in a state whose foreclosure rate now sits near the national middle, even the Elevated tier describes pressure rather than crisis. Second, the CFPB reports county delinquency only where a county has at least 1,000 mortgages, so for sixty-five of Michigan’s eighty-three counties we substituted the statewide delinquency rate. Because that component carries only 20 percent of the weight, the substitution has a modest effect on the rankings. Third, the index measures leading pressure, not completed foreclosures. Where our scores and realized foreclosure activity disagree, we say so rather than force a match.
Findings
The index: pressure at the edges and the industrial core, calm in the west
Ranked from most to least risk, the index tells a story that runs against the assumption that a state’s housing stress lives in its biggest, fastest-growing cities.
The counties at the top are mostly small and rural, clustered in the northern Lower Peninsula and the Upper Peninsula. They share a pattern: modest incomes stretched thin against housing costs, thin and slow resale markets, and weak local job bases. Lake County tops the list at 70.0 on the strength of the heaviest cost burden in the state, 35.2 percent of its mortgaged owners spending more than 30 percent of income on housing, paired with 7.6 percent unemployment. Oscoda follows at 68.1, with the state’s second-heaviest cost burden and the highest rural unemployment at 8.8 percent.
The exception to the rural rule sits fifth on the list, and it is the largest county in Michigan. Wayne County, home to Detroit, scores 63.4, carried by the highest serious delinquency rate in the state and unemployment near 9 percent. At the other end, West Michigan is the safest ground anywhere. Ottawa County, on the Lake Michigan shore between Holland and Grand Haven, scores 16.7, the lowest in the state, with strong jobs, low cost burden, and delinquency of just 0.3 percent. This is the exact inverse of the strained rural north and the aging industrial core.
The counties under the most pressure
Lake (index 70.0, Elevated). A small, low-income county in the northern Lower Peninsula, Lake carries the heaviest housing cost burden in Michigan. When 35.2 percent of mortgaged owners are already spending more than 30 percent of income on housing, a job loss or a medical bill turns into a missed payment faster than it would in a wealthier place. The county holds very few mortgages, so its risk per owner is high while its raw foreclosure count will always be small.
Oscoda and Clare (index 68.1 and 66.3, Elevated). These northern Lower Peninsula counties pair very high cost burden with the worst rural unemployment in the state, 8.8 and 8.5 percent. Thin local economies and slow housing markets leave stretched owners with few exits.
Alger (index 65.2, Elevated). In the Upper Peninsula, Alger stands out for the slowest market among the leaders, a median 67 days on the market, alongside an elevated cost burden. A homeowner who needs to sell to avoid foreclosure waits more than two months for a buyer.
Wayne (index 63.4, Elevated). Wayne County, home to Detroit, is the one large metro near the top of the list, and it is the finding that most defines Michigan. It carries the highest serious delinquency rate of any county in the state at 1.1 percent, unemployment of 8.7 percent, and it is the largest county in Michigan by a wide margin. Detroit has carried housing distress for a generation, and it remains the place where Michigan’s foreclosure pressure is most concentrated in absolute terms.
Genesee (index 56.2, Elevated). Flint’s county is the second large metro in the Elevated tier. It pairs 8.3 percent unemployment, among the highest of any populous county, with a serious delinquency rate of 0.9 percent. The Flint area has never fully recovered the manufacturing base it lost, and the payment stress shows up in the delinquency data.
The metros: Detroit and Flint apart, the west calm
In most of the country, the biggest metros carry either the most risk or the least, and analysts argue about which. Michigan gives a clear answer, and it splits the metros in two.
On one side sits the old industrial core. Wayne County (Detroit) grades Elevated, and Genesee (Flint) does too, with Saginaw (45.7) and Macomb (48.9) close behind in the Moderate tier. These are counties shaped by decades of manufacturing decline, higher unemployment, and delinquency that runs above the state. On the other side sits everything in the booming west and the affluent Detroit exurbs. Grand Rapids’ Kent County (24.2), Holland’s Ottawa County (16.7), Ann Arbor’s Washtenaw County (22.5), Kalamazoo (27.8), and Oakland (29.3) and Livingston (27.1) north of Detroit all grade Lower. Strong job growth, in-migration, and rising incomes have kept their homeowners well ahead of trouble even as prices climbed. When people talk about foreclosure risk in Michigan’s cities, they are, for the most part, talking about Detroit and Flint.
Risk versus volume
Risk per homeowner and total foreclosure volume are different measurements, and Michigan shows why the distinction matters more here than almost anywhere. Wayne County holds nearly 800,000 housing units, more than the entire Upper Peninsula combined, so even a modest rate there produces more filings in raw numbers than a high rate in a place like Lake or Oscoda. Wayne is unusual because it scores high on both: it is the largest county in the state and an Elevated one, which is why Detroit dominates Michigan’s absolute foreclosure activity and ranked second in the nation for bank repossessions in a single month this year. For a homeowner weighing their own exposure, the risk index is the relevant number. For anyone sizing the market, volume is. We report both and caution against collapsing them into one claim.
Leading indicators against realized activity
Michigan does not appear on ATTOM’s mid-year 2026 lists of the states or counties with the highest foreclosure rates, which is consistent with a state sitting 23rd nationally. But the one place ATTOM does name Michigan is telling: Detroit led the state and ranked second in the country for completed bank repossessions in May 2026. That is exactly where our index runs hottest. When a set of leading indicators built from delinquency, cost burden, jobs, and market softness independently points at the same county the realized-repossession data ranks worst, both measures gain credibility. The pressure our index reads in Wayne County is already showing up in completed actions.
What is driving the 2026 rise
Michigan’s increase is best understood as the tail end of a long normalization, not the front edge of a new crisis. At 4.3 percent year over year, its rise is the mildest of the states we have studied.
Foreclosure filings were held down for years by pandemic-era moratoria and forbearance, and by a labor market that kept most Michigan owners current. As those supports ended, filings drifted back up. But Michigan came into this period having already worked through the worst housing correction in the country a decade and a half ago, so it had less distance to travel back toward normal than states that boomed and are now cooling.
The new strain is concentrated where it always has been in Michigan: the aging industrial counties and the low-income rural north. Serious delinquency has moved from 0.5 percent in early 2024 to 0.7 percent by late 2025, a small absolute change but a clear direction, and it is highest in exactly the places our index flags, led by Wayne County at 1.1 percent. Home prices that ran up through the recent boom remain high relative to rural and working-class incomes, which keeps cost burden elevated in the counties at the top of the list. And mortgage rates that have stayed higher for longer have removed the refinance escape valve that used to let a stretched owner lower a payment.
How today compares to the last crash
For all the recent acceleration, the honest frame for Michigan is history. No state has a starker before-and-after. At the peak of the last housing crisis Michigan recorded about 135,874 foreclosure filings in 2010, when roughly one in every 33 homes drew a filing, the fifth-largest total in the country and among the worst rates anywhere. Detroit was the national face of the crisis. The state climbed there fast, about 106,058 filings in 2008 and 118,302 in 2009, then fell just as hard as the market cleared, to roughly 76,000 by 2012 and far lower since. The 12,000 to 13,000 filings we project for full-year 2026 sit more than 90 percent below the 2010 peak, closer to a rounding error against the crisis than to any echo of it.
That is the frame this report insists on. Michigan’s foreclosure activity is rising, and it is concentrated in identifiable places, but the scale is an affordability squeeze in the state’s poorer corners, not a repeat of the collapse that once defined it. And because a filing is only the start of the legal process, not a home already lost, the counts here describe mounting pressure, not completed foreclosures.
The rest-of-2026 outlook
We offer the following as a projection, not a forecast dressed up as certainty, and we show the method so it can be judged.
Michigan recorded 6,318 foreclosure filings in the first half of 2026. If the second half simply matches the first, the state finishes the year near 12,600 filings. Because the year-over-year rise has been modest and the underlying pressures, rising delinquency and elevated cost burden in the counties above, point gently the same direction, we treat a range of 12,000 to 13,000 filings as reasonable for full-year 2026. That would extend a streak of small annual increases while keeping Michigan near the national middle and more than 90 percent below its own history.
Two things temper that. First, the base is low, and Michigan is rising off it slowly. Second, serious delinquency, the truest early signal, remains at 0.7 percent statewide. We expect a steady, contained climb through the rest of 2026, concentrated in Detroit, Flint, and the rural north, rather than a broad statewide surge.
If you are a Michigan homeowner facing foreclosure
This report is a market analysis, not legal advice, but the data points to a few things worth knowing. Michigan is primarily a non-judicial foreclosure state, with most foreclosures conducted through what state law calls foreclosure by advertisement. The lender generally does not have to file a lawsuit before foreclosing. After the required notice of sale is published for four consecutive weeks, the property is sold at a sheriff’s sale. Michigan also provides a post-sale statutory redemption period that many states do not. For most owner-occupied homes, that period is six months, although it may extend to one year in certain lower-balance cases or be shortened to 30 days if the property is abandoned.
That redemption window is real, but it is not a long-term strategy. Redeeming a home generally requires paying the statutory redemption amount, including the foreclosure sale price, accrued interest, and certain allowable fees. For many homeowners, the better options come earlier, such as working with the lender on reinstatement or a loan modification, or selling the home before the sheriff’s sale to pay off the mortgage and avoid a completed foreclosure. Avoiding foreclosure can also reduce the long-term impact on your credit, since a foreclosure may remain on a credit report for up to seven years. NestCash works with Michigan homeowners in exactly this situation. Our guide on how to sell a house in foreclosure walks through the timeline and the choices in more detail, and Detroit owners can read our guide to selling a Detroit house as-is.
The full data
| Rank | County | Risk Index | Grade | Price-cut share | Median DOM | Cost burden | 90+ delinquency | Unemployment |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lake | 70.0 | Elevated | 22.5% | 38 | 35.2% | 0.7%* | 7.6% |
| 2 | Oscoda | 68.1 | Elevated | 17.1% | 38 | 34.7% | 0.7%* | 8.8% |
| 3 | Clare | 66.3 | Elevated | 19.2% | 47 | 31.3% | 0.7%* | 8.5% |
| 4 | Alger | 65.2 | Elevated | 17.9% | 67 | 29.6% | 0.7%* | 6.3% |
| 5 | Wayne | 63.4 | Elevated | 15.2% | 45 | 26.2% | 1.1% | 8.7% |
| 6 | Montmorency | 60.8 | Elevated | 19.6% | 45 | 31.4% | 0.7%* | 6.1% |
| 7 | Crawford | 59.8 | Elevated | 23.4% | 41 | 28.8% | 0.7%* | 7.2% |
| 8 | Iosco | 58.5 | Elevated | 23.1% | 37 | 28.9% | 0.7%* | 7.3% |
| 9 | Oceana | 56.7 | Elevated | 24.4% | 47 | 27.2% | 0.7%* | 5.7% |
| 10 | Genesee | 56.2 | Elevated | 19.9% | 40 | 24.4% | 0.9% | 8.3% |
| 11 | Branch | 56.2 | Elevated | 26.2% | 64 | 23.2% | 0.7%* | 5.2% |
| 12 | Gladwin | 56.1 | Elevated | 23.8% | 38 | 28.4% | 0.7%* | 6.2% |
| 13 | Ogemaw | 55.8 | Elevated | 24.8% | 37 | 26.7% | 0.7%* | 7.3% |
| 14 | Newaygo | 55.6 | Elevated | 22.8% | 38 | 30.8% | 0.7%* | 4.4% |
| 15 | Missaukee | 55.4 | Elevated | 18.9% | 45 | 27.2% | 0.7%* | 7.2% |
| 16 | Osceola | 55.1 | Elevated | 19.0% | 46 | 27.6% | 0.7%* | 6.5% |
| 17 | Arenac | 53.8 | Elevated | 30.3% | 48 | 22.3% | 0.7%* | 6.3% |
| 18 | Hillsdale | 53.6 | Elevated | 20.7% | 54 | 26.9% | 0.7%* | 4.5% |
| 19 | Sanilac | 53.1 | Elevated | 22.4% | 49 | 25.0% | 0.7%* | 6.1% |
| 20 | Muskegon | 51.3 | Elevated | 17.2% | 39 | 23.4% | 1.0% | 6.8% |
| 21 | Mecosta | 51.0 | Elevated | 23.0% | 51 | 24.5% | 0.7%* | 5.0% |
| 22 | Cheboygan | 50.9 | Elevated | 13.2% | 50 | 26.0% | 0.7%* | 7.0% |
| 23 | St. Joseph | 50.5 | Elevated | 23.2% | 49 | 24.3% | 0.7%* | 5.2% |
| 24 | Ontonagon | 50.1 | Elevated | 18.0% | 36 | 25.9% | 0.7%* | 7.6% |
| 25 | Kalkaska | 49.5 | Moderate | 27.4% | 45 | 24.1% | 0.7%* | 4.3% |
| 26 | Isabella | 49.4 | Moderate | 18.9% | 48 | 23.6% | 0.7%* | 6.8% |
| 27 | St. Clair | 49.2 | Moderate | 19.7% | 39 | 23.0% | 0.9% | 6.4% |
| 28 | Roscommon | 49.0 | Moderate | 25.8% | 44 | 24.0% | 0.7%* | 4.8% |
| 29 | Mackinac | 48.9 | Moderate | 6.1% | 38 | 27.2% | 0.7%* | 9.4% |
| 30 | Macomb | 48.9 | Moderate | 17.8% | 35 | 25.2% | 0.9% | 5.8% |
| 31 | Jackson | 48.9 | Moderate | 21.2% | 40 | 21.5% | 1.0% | 5.8% |
| 32 | Alpena | 48.5 | Moderate | 25.2% | 34 | 23.2% | 0.7%* | 7.1% |
| 33 | Van Buren | 48.3 | Moderate | 22.0% | 42 | 26.0% | 0.7%* | 4.4% |
| 34 | Saginaw | 45.7 | Moderate | 17.7% | 45 | 21.5% | 0.8% | 6.6% |
| 35 | Iron | 45.2 | Moderate | 14.0% | 35 | 28.5% | 0.7%* | 4.7% |
| 36 | Bay | 45.1 | Moderate | 22.1% | 46 | 23.0% | 0.7%* | 4.6% |
| 37 | Antrim | 44.9 | Moderate | 13.8% | 39 | 28.3% | 0.7%* | 4.1% |
| 38 | Manistee | 44.6 | Moderate | 16.2% | 42 | 23.9% | 0.7%* | 6.2% |
| 39 | Barry | 44.5 | Moderate | 23.6% | 36 | 23.5% | 0.7%* | 5.2% |
| 40 | Monroe | 44.1 | Moderate | 16.5% | 39 | 21.8% | 1.0% | 5.0% |
| 41 | Huron | 43.6 | Lower | 17.9% | 47 | 23.6% | 0.7%* | 4.6% |
| 42 | Cass | 43.4 | Lower | 21.0% | 46 | 22.5% | 0.7%* | 4.6% |
| 43 | Tuscola | 43.4 | Lower | 15.2% | 41 | 23.8% | 0.7%* | 6.2% |
| 44 | Lenawee | 43.1 | Lower | 14.6% | 40 | 25.1% | 0.7%* | 5.4% |
| 45 | Presque Isle | 43.0 | Lower | 17.1% | 37 | 23.6% | 0.7%* | 6.3% |
| 46 | Delta | 42.7 | Lower | 12.8% | 38 | 26.4% | 0.7%* | 5.1% |
| 47 | Alcona | 42.7 | Lower | 12.1% | 43 | 25.7% | 0.7%* | 5.0% |
| 48 | Mason | 42.0 | Lower | 26.2% | 36 | 21.8% | 0.7%* | 4.6% |
| 49 | Berrien | 41.9 | Lower | 17.0% | 41 | 27.0% | 0.3% | 6.5% |
| 50 | Gogebic | 41.8 | Lower | 16.8% | 39 | 21.8% | 0.7%* | 6.9% |
| 51 | Leelanau | 41.7 | Lower | 14.8% | 34 | 27.4% | 0.7%* | 3.9% |
| 52 | Lapeer | 39.6 | Lower | 19.8% | 42 | 21.0% | 0.7%* | 5.1% |
| 53 | Houghton | 39.6 | Lower | 26.4% | 31 | 20.0% | 0.7%* | 5.7% |
| 54 | Emmet | 38.7 | Lower | 14.5% | 44 | 24.0% | 0.7%* | 3.6% |
| 55 | Grand Traverse | 37.6 | Lower | 15.1% | 39 | 24.2% | 0.7%* | 3.6% |
| 56 | Ingham | 37.3 | Lower | 15.7% | 38 | 21.9% | 0.6% | 6.3% |
| 57 | Gratiot | 36.8 | Lower | 17.1% | 52 | 18.8% | 0.7%* | 4.7% |
| 58 | Montcalm | 36.0 | Lower | 18.5% | 30 | 23.4% | 0.7%* | 4.0% |
| 59 | Wexford | 36.0 | Lower | 17.3% | 37 | 20.2% | 0.7%* | 5.7% |
| 60 | Calhoun | 35.2 | Lower | 17.9% | 40 | 23.9% | 0.2% | 6.8% |
| 61 | Benzie | 35.0 | Lower | 11.8% | 36 | 24.0% | 0.7%* | 4.1% |
| 62 | Otsego | 34.8 | Lower | 17.6% | 36 | 21.1% | 0.7%* | 4.5% |
| 63 | Shiawassee | 34.3 | Lower | 16.2% | 35 | 21.7% | 0.7%* | 4.4% |
| 64 | Charlevoix | 34.2 | Lower | 16.6% | 37 | 21.8% | 0.7%* | 3.8% |
| 65 | Luce | 33.9 | Lower | 9.1% | 32 | 18.0% | 0.7%* | 9.9% |
| 66 | Keweenaw | 32.7 | Lower | 5.9% | 35 | 24.3% | 0.7%* | 4.8% |
| 67 | Baraga | 32.1 | Lower | 8.2% | 20 | 24.3% | 0.7%* | 6.4% |
| 68 | Menominee | 32.1 | Lower | 13.9% | 38 | 19.2% | 0.7%* | 5.6% |
| 69 | Chippewa | 30.9 | Lower | 11.7% | 34 | 19.6% | 0.7%* | 6.1% |
| 70 | Eaton | 30.2 | Lower | 14.3% | 30 | 21.2% | 0.7%* | 4.4% |
| 71 | Midland | 29.7 | Lower | 19.1% | 31 | 18.3% | 0.7%* | 4.8% |
| 72 | Dickinson | 29.6 | Lower | 15.1% | 42 | 18.3% | 0.7%* | 4.1% |
| 73 | Oakland | 29.3 | Lower | 16.5% | 32 | 21.4% | 0.5% | 4.8% |
| 74 | Allegan | 28.9 | Lower | 17.9% | 39 | 21.4% | 0.5% | 3.0% |
| 75 | Marquette | 28.7 | Lower | 13.8% | 21 | 21.8% | 0.7%* | 4.9% |
| 76 | Kalamazoo | 27.8 | Lower | 16.9% | 38 | 19.4% | 0.4% | 5.6% |
| 77 | Schoolcraft | 27.1 | Lower | 4.5% | 26 | 21.2% | 0.7%* | 6.7% |
| 78 | Livingston | 27.1 | Lower | 13.0% | 34 | 19.9% | 0.7% | 3.7% |
| 79 | Ionia | 27.0 | Lower | 12.8% | 29 | 19.5% | 0.7%* | 4.9% |
| 80 | Kent | 24.2 | Lower | 16.1% | 32 | 19.4% | 0.5% | 4.2% |
| 81 | Clinton | 23.6 | Lower | 8.9% | 35 | 19.3% | 0.7%* | 3.7% |
| 82 | Washtenaw | 22.5 | Lower | 13.9% | 36 | 22.0% | 0.2% | 4.4% |
| 83 | Ottawa | 16.7 | Lower | 15.2% | 36 | 17.9% | 0.3% | 3.6% |
*County-level delinquency was unavailable, so the Michigan statewide rate is used. See Methodology.
What we will watch
We plan to update this index quarterly. Three things will tell us whether Michigan’s slow climb is turning into something larger: the serious delinquency rate, which is the earliest honest signal and has already begun to rise, whether the strain stays contained in Detroit, Flint, and the rural north or spreads toward the booming west, and whether the counties where our index runs ahead of realized activity begin to see those filings arrive. Michigan’s rate is near the national middle today, and far below its own history. The question the next few quarters will answer is whether it holds there.
Sources and data
- Foreclosure activity and trend. ATTOM Data Solutions, 2026 Mid-Year U.S. Foreclosure Market Report and its monthly reports. Used for statewide filing counts, the national rank, and the Detroit repossession figure. Historical year-end Michigan filing totals in the 2008-to-2026 comparison come from ATTOM and RealtyTrac year-end reports (2008, 2009, and 2010 are published property counts; the 2012 figure is derived from RealtyTrac’s published 1.69 percent rate); the 2026 figure is this report’s full-year projection.
- Housing market softness. Realtor.com Economic Research, county inventory core metrics through June 2026. Used for the price-cut share, median days on market, and active listing counts.
- Housing, mortgage status, and cost burden. U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey five-year estimates. Used for county housing counts, the mortgaged-owner universe, housing cost burden, and the denominators behind the rates.
- Mortgage delinquency. CFPB Mortgage Performance Trends, data through September 2025. Used for the 90-or-more day delinquency rates.
About NestCash
NestCash buys houses for cash in twelve states, including throughout Michigan. We publish original housing research to help homeowners, buyers, and investors understand the markets we work in. This report may be cited and its charts embedded with attribution to NestCash.
John is the Founder of NestCash and a leading voice in real estate investing and housing market strategy. With experience across AZ, FL, CO, MI, IL, TX, PA, NC, OH, TN, and GA, he helps buyers, sellers, and investors make smarter decisions using real-world insight and market data.