U.S. foreclosures drop 15% in February

Completed U.S. foreclosures totaled 39,000 in February, a roughly 15.2 percent decrease from 46,000 in the same month a year earlier, according to real estate market tracker CoreLogic.

The latest monthly figure - which also is down from 43,000 foreclosures in January - has decreased 67 percent from a national peak of completed foreclosures in September 2010, according to a news release.

As of Feb. 28, the national foreclosure inventory comprised roughly 553,000 homes, or 1.4 percent of all homes with a mortgage, down from 761,000, or 1.9 percent, in February 2014.

“What's encouraging is that fewer Americans are seriously delinquent in paying their mortgages, which in turn is reducing the foreclosure inventory across the country,” CoreLogic President and CEO Anand Nallathambi said in the release, referring to a an improved 4 percent serious delinquency rate in February.

In Missouri, the February foreclosure inventory was 0.7 percent of all homes with a mortgage. CoreLogic also reported 12,204 completed foreclosures in the state for the 12 months ended Feb. 28, down from 14,914 in the same period a year earlier.