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ZOMBIE FORECLOSURES REMAIN A SMALL FRACTION OF U.S. HOUSING INVENTORY IN FIRST QUARTER OF 2025

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Only One in 14,700 U.S. Homes Sit Vacant During Foreclosure, Near Five-Year Low; Zombie Foreclosures Virtually Unchanged Quarterly, Down 3 Percent Annually; Trends Hold as Overall Foreclosure Activity Remains Down

IRVINE, Calif., Feb. 20, 2025 /PRNewswire/ — ATTOM, a leading curator of land, property data, and real estate analytics, today released its first-quarter 2025 Vacant Property and Zombie Foreclosure Report showing that 1.4 million (1,372,396) residential properties in the United States are vacant. That figure represents 1.3 percent, or one in 76 homes, across the nation – the same as in the fourth quarter of last year and up slightly from a year ago.

The report analyzes publicly recorded real estate data collected by ATTOM — including foreclosure status, equity and owner-occupancy status — matched against monthly updated vacancy data. (See full methodology below).

The report also reveals that 212,268 residential properties in the U.S. are in the process of foreclosure in the first quarter of this year, down 1.5 percent from the fourth quarter of last year and down 12.6 percent from the first quarter of 2024. Foreclosure activity has decreased for five consecutive quarters following a surge in cases that occurred after the nationwide moratorium on lenders pursuing delinquent homeowners—implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic—was lifted in mid-2021.

Among those pre-foreclosure properties, 7,094 sit vacant as zombie foreclosures (pre-foreclosure properties abandoned by owners) in the first quarter of 2025. That figure is virtually the same as in the last quarter, but down 3.3 percent from a year ago.

The first-quarter data represents another measure in a long-term pattern of zombie properties representing just a miniscule portion of the nation’s total housing stock. Currently, only one in every 14,668 homes across the U.S. has been vacated due to foreclosure, an improvement from one in 14,591 in late 2024 and one in 13,905 during the first quarter of last year. This ratio remains well below the recent peak of one in 11,412 recorded in late 2023, representing one of the lowest levels in the past five years.

Those numbers mean that most neighborhoods around the U.S. are totally or almost completely free of zombie foreclosures that can attract vandals and spread blight. The scenario stands out yet again as one of many enduring effects of a housing market boom around the nation now in its 14th year.

“You’d have to take a very long walk through most U.S. communities to come across even one zombie foreclosure—and even then, you might not find any,” said Rob Barber, CEO of ATTOM. “This marks a significant turnaround from the period following the Great Recession in the late 2000s, when a collapsing housing market and abandoned properties posed serious risks to many neighborhoods. The latest figures highlight one of the many benefits of the nation’s prolonged housing market boom for both homeowners and renters alike.”

He added that “we have every reason to believe this will continue into the foreseeable future, given high levels of equity flowing from rising home prices and historically low supplies of homes for sale that make the few abandoned properties out there more likely to be snapped up by buyers.”

Zombie foreclosures either down or up by small amounts around U.S.

A total of 7,094 residential properties facing possible foreclosure have been vacated by their owners nationwide in the first quarter of 2025, down 0.2 percent from 7,109 in the fourth quarter of 2024 and down 3.3 percent from 7,338 in the first quarter of 2024. The number of zombie properties has gone down or remained the same quarterly in 22 states, usually decreasing by less than 25. The number has increased in 28 states, again by small amounts.

The biggest percent decreases from the first quarter of 2024 to the first quarter of 2025 in states that had at least 50 zombie homes a year ago are in Maryland (zombie properties down 38 percent, from 104 to 65), Georgia (down 35 percent, from 81 to 53), California (down 30 percent, from 310 to 217), New Jersey (down 23 percent, from 260 to 199) and Ohio (down 16 percent, from 597 to 503).

The largest annual increases among states that had at least 50 zombie foreclosures in the first quarter of 2025 have come in Missouri (zombie properties up 85 percent, from 27 to 50), Michigan (up 51 percent, from 55 to 83), South Carolina (up 31 percent, from 74 to 97), Indiana (up 28 percent, from 215 to 276) and Kansas (up 26 percent, from 69 to 87).

Overall vacancy rates shift by tiny amounts

The vacancy rate for all residential properties in the U.S. has remained virtually the same for 12 quarters in a row, hovering around 1.3 percent. The latest figure of 1.32 percent (one in 76 properties) is almost the same as the 1.31 percent level in fourth quarter of 2024 and up slightly from 1.26 percent in the first quarter of last year.

States with the highest vacancy rates for all residential properties are Oklahoma (2.41 percent during the first quarter of this year), Kansas (2.34 percent), Missouri (2.18 percent), Alabama (2.16 percent) and West Virginia (2.09 percent).

Those with the lowest overall vacancy rates are New Hampshire (0.34 percent), Vermont (0.41 percent), New Jersey (0.49 percent), Idaho (0.52 percent) and Connecticut (0.56 percent).

Other high-level findings from the first quarter of 2025:

Among 171 metropolitan statistical areas in the U.S. with at least 100,000 residential properties in the first quarter of 2025, those with at least 100 properties facing possible foreclosure and the highest zombie foreclosure rates are Peoria, IL (15.5 percent of properties in the foreclosure process are vacant); Wichita, KS (12.5 percent); Kansas City, MO (10.9 percent); Toledo, OH (10.6 percent) and Fort Wayne, IN (10 percent).Aside from Kansas City, the highest zombie-foreclosure rates in major metro areas with at least 500,000 residential properties and at least 100 homes facing foreclosure in the first quarter of 2025 are in Cleveland, OH (9.1 percent of homes in the foreclosure process are vacant); St. Louis, MO (8.9 percent); Indianapolis, IN (8.5 percent) and Detroit, MI (6.1 percent).Among the 24.8 million investor-owned homes throughout the U.S. in the first quarter of 2025, about 877,800 are vacant, or 3.5 percent. The highest levels of vacant investor-owned homes are in Indiana (6.9 percent vacant), Illinois (6 percent), Alabama (6 percent), Oklahoma (5.9 percent) and Kansas (5.9 percent).Among the roughly 12,300 foreclosed, bank-owned homes in the U.S. during the first quarter of 2025, 14 percent are vacant. In states with at least 50 bank-owned homes, the largest vacancy rates are in Kansas (37.7 percent vacant), Indiana (27.6 percent), Missouri (23.9 percent), Ohio (22.4 percent) and Illinois (22 percent).          The highest zombie-foreclosure rates in U.S. counties with at least 500 properties in the foreclosure process during the first quarter of 2025 are in Broome County (Binghamton), NY (15 percent of homes in the foreclosure process are vacant); Marion County (Indianapolis), IN (11.2 percent); Cuyahoga County (Cleveland), OH (10.4 percent); Niagara County (Niagara Falls), NY (8.7 percent) and Pinellas County (St. Petersburg), FL (8.5 percent).Among zip codes with enough data to analyze, 65 of the top 100 where zombie properties represent the largest portions of all homes are in New York. The highest rates are in zip codes 14892 in Waverly (Tioga County), NY (one in 260 homes); 12202 in Albany (Albany County), NY (one in 265); 61605 in Peoria (Peoria County), IL (one in 274 homes); 12887 in Whitehall (Washington County), NY (one in 283) and 13795 in Kirkwood (Broome County), NY (one in 284 homes).

Report Methodology

ATTOM analyzed county tax assessor data for 103.7 million residential properties for vacancy, broken down by foreclosure status and owner-occupancy status in the fourth quarter of 2024. Only metropolitan statistical areas with at least 100,000 residential properties, counties with at least 50,000 residential properties and zip codes with at least 1,000 residential properties were included in the analysis.

 About ATTOM

ATTOM provides premium property data and analytics that power a myriad of solutions that improve transparency, innovation, digitization and efficiency in a data-driven economy. ATTOM multi-sources property tax, deed, mortgage, foreclosure, environmental risk, natural hazard, and neighborhood data for more than 155 million U.S. residential and commercial properties covering 99 percent of the nation’s population. A rigorous data management process involving more than 20 steps validates, standardizes, and enhances the real estate data collected by ATTOM, assigning each property record with a persistent, unique ID — the ATTOM ID. The 30TB ATTOM Data Warehouse fuels innovation in many industries including mortgage, real estate, insurance, marketing, government and more through flexible data delivery solutions that include ATTOM Cloudbulk file licensesproperty data APIsreal estate market trendsproperty navigator and more. Also, introducing our newest innovative solution, making property data more readily accessible and optimized for AI applications – AI-Ready Solutions

Media Contact:
Megan Hunt
megan.hunt@attomdata.com 

Data and Report Licensing:
datareports@attomdata.com

 

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SOURCE ATTOM

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Marquis Who’s Who Honors Rupin Chothani for Engineering Leadership

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UNIONDALE, N.Y., July 23, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Marquis Who’s Who honors Rupin Chothani for his leadership in engineering and project management. With more than two decades of professional experience to his credit, Mr. Chothani leverages a unique expertise in fire and petrochemical solutions to find success in his field. As project manager, project engineer and proposal manager at Technip Energies N.V., Mr. Chothani ensures effective results.

Drawn to Engineering

Coming from a family of engineers, Mr. Chothani was naturally drawn to the profession. This inclination was reinforced by comprehensive aptitude and attitude tests administered at the age of 14, which highlighted his strengths in engineering and architecture. Ultimately, this direction reinforced his determination to pursue a degree in mechanical engineering.

By 2003, Mr. Chothani earned a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Mumbai. After a brief role as a junior manufacturing engineer at Artech Cooling Tower Pvt. Ltd., he completed a Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Bridgeport in 2006. In addition to these degrees, Mr. Chothani later achieved AutoCAD certification.

Following his graduation in 2006, Mr. Chothani joined CB&I Lummus / ABB Lummus Heat Transfer (now Lummus Technology) as a thermal engineer. Though his work at Lummus Technology lasted only three years, Mr. Chothani was greatly influenced by mentor figures at the company. These mentors, including Ken Catala, Peter Harvard, Chin Dang and Miller Alanath Carter, provided essential guidance.

Building a Family

In December 2008, Mr. Chothani married his wife, Cathy. Along with his son and daughter, his family has contributed richly to his success in engineering and they continue to inspire him to excel. In addition to their support, Mr. Chothani recognizes that there is no alternative to hard work and dedicated learning.

From Lummus Technology to Technip Energies N.V.

Following his work at Lummus Technology, Mr. Chothani worked with Maco Corporation India Pvt. Ltd. By 2011, he joined Complete Heat Transfer Solutions – Environ Energy Systems as a thermal and mechanical engineer. By 2013, Mr. Chothani became a part of Technip Energies N.V. as a furnace mechanical engineer. By 2023, he added to this role and became a project manager, project engineer and proposal manager at the company.

In his current role at Technip Energies N.V., Mr. Chothani is responsible for a variety of essential duties. He manages and executes on engineering projects for ethylene cracking furnaces and heaters, and oversees proprietary technologies. Additionally, he actively coordinates with procurement, logistics, mechanical engineering and process engineering teams to ensure effective results.

Plans for the Future

Moving forward, Mr. Chothani hopes to advance his project management skills, particularly within the firejet industry. At the same time, he aims to share his knowledge of the industry with the next generation of professionals. Outside of his professional ambitions, Mr. Chothani intends to prepare his children to find success, inspiring them and their peers with hands-on experiments and full-day events.

About Marquis Who’s Who®:

Since 1899, when A. N. Marquis printed the First Edition of Who’s Who in America®, Marquis Who’s Who® has chronicled the lives of the most accomplished individuals and innovators from every significant field, including politics, business, medicine, law, education, art, religion and entertainment. Who’s Who in America® remains an essential biographical source for thousands of researchers, journalists, librarians and executive search firms worldwide. The suite of Marquis® publications can be viewed at the official Marquis Who’s Who® website, www.marquiswhoswho.com.

Marquis Who’s Who
Uniondale, NY
(844) 394 – 6946
info@marquiswhoswho.com
www.marquiswhoswho.com

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COALITION OF INDEPENDENT INTERNET PROVIDERS ASKS CRTC TO FIX ERRORS IN WHOLESALE FIBRE RATES

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Coalition of competitive ISPs say current fibre rates make competition impossible and threatens to harm millions of Canadian consumers

CHATHAM, ON, July 23, 2026 /CNW/ — A coalition of independent internet service providers (the Coalition) led by TekSavvy Solutions Inc. (TekSavvy) today applied to the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) to review and vary Telecom Order 2026-77, which set final wholesale rates for fibre internet services. In that decision, the CRTC approved wholesale rates for fibre internet services that are higher than the retail prices charged by the large carriers. This makes competition impossible, as independent providers are forced to either sell at a loss or set prices above the large carriers, leaving millions of Canadian consumers without competitive options for essential internet services.

The application identifies key errors that led the CRTC to approve severely inflated final wholesale rates, which make it economically impossible for independent providers to compete. The Coalition argues that the CRTC’s incorrect rates negate the very purpose of Canada’s wholesale framework, which is to foster competition in retail broadband markets. Specifically, the Coalition asks the CRTC to make three key changes to Telecom Order 2026-77:

Eliminate one cost factor that is inconsistent with the CRTC’s established costing principles, which artificially increased fibre wholesale rates by an estimated 25% to 30% (the Adjustment Factor).Reduce another element of the costing that is inflated above reasonable levels: The Coalition calls on the CRTC to reduce the markup applied to wholesale fibre services from 30% to 15%, reflecting declining costs, operational efficiencies, and the need to support competition.Correct technical errors relating to certain wholesale fibre speed descriptions.

“Canadians were promised greater competition for fibre internet services, but these rates make competition impossible.” said Andy Kaplan-Myrth, TekSavvy’s Vice President of Regulatory and Carrier Affairs. “The CRTC must correct these errors to ensure its wholesale rates promote broadband competition that challenges the market power of monopoly incumbents, lowers prices, and increases consumer choice.”

About the Coalition

The Coalition consists of competitive telecommunications providers and industry associations advocating for fair wholesale access to fibre networks and a competitive broadband marketplace that delivers affordable, high-quality Internet services to Canadians, including: TekSavvy Solutions Inc., BC Broadband Association (“BCBA”), Canada-Wide Internet Service Providers Association (“CanWISP”), Fibernetics Inc., ISP Telecom Inc., National Capital FreeNet Inc., Novus Entertainment Inc. and Purple Cow Internet Inc.

About TekSavvy Solution Inc.

Based in Chatham, Ontario, TekSavvy is Canada’s largest independent telecom service company. TekSavvy has been proudly delivering award-winning services and fighting for consumers’ rights for nearly 30 years. TekSavvy is committed to providing quality competitive choice and closing Canada’s digital divide.

SOURCE TekSavvy Solutions Inc.

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Monk Launches Voice Collections, Bringing AI Phone Calls and Callbacks to Accounts Receivable

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Monk’s collections agent, Julia, can now place outbound collection calls and answer inbound AR questions from a dedicated business number, so finance teams can use the channel that collects best without adding headcount.

Multimedia: Watch Voice Collections in action: https://youtu.be/w09PoN1yACE 

NEW YORK, July 23, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Monk, the AI-native accounts receivable platform, today launched Voice Collections. Its collections agent, Julia, can now place outbound collection calls and answer inbound customer questions about invoices and payments from a dedicated phone number for each organization. The feature brings the phone, long the most effective collections channel and the hardest one to scale, into Monk’s Intelligent Collections.

Roughly $10 trillion sits in unpaid invoices worldwide, and the average invoice now takes 59 days to clear (Allianz). Most accounts receivable runs on email, and most of it waits. More than half of B2B invoices in the United States are overdue at any given time, and 92% of businesses are typically paid after their due date (Chaser, 2026). Phone calls recover overdue invoices two to three times better than email (Dunwise), yet 91% of finance teams still rely on email as their main follow-up channel and only 56% use the phone, because calling every overdue account by hand does not scale and a single human dunning call can cost $12 to $18 (HighRadius).

Voice Collections gives teams that coverage. Julia can call on the accounts a playbook flags for phone follow-up, and answer when a customer calls the same number back to ask about an invoice, a payment, or a bank detail. Businesses that follow up on 100% of overdue invoices are 76% more likely to be paid within a week (Chaser), and a voice agent is what makes full coverage possible.

Monk’s collections agent is already proven on the accounts it handles by email. Across Monk’s first 100 customers, Julia reaches customers with a 24% higher response rate than standard dunning and resolves 88.2% of collections with zero human intervention. Voice extends that reach to the phone.

“For years the assumption was that customers would not talk to an AI on the phone,” said George Kurdin, Founder and CEO of Monk. “The evidence now points the other way. People engage with a good voice agent, and in AR the phone was always the channel that collected best. We built Voice Collections so finance teams can finally use it at the scale email gave them.”

That assumption is worth retiring. In a University of Chicago Booth field study of roughly 70,000 interviews, people interviewed by a voice AI agent were 12% more likely to receive an offer, 18% more likely to start, and 17% more likely to still be there after 30 days, and 80% chose the voice AI over a human when given the choice. The setting was recruiting rather than collections, but the finding travels: given a capable voice agent, people lean in rather than hang up. A call also does something email cannot, which is secure a verbal promise to pay in the moment.

Built for finance, with the phone agents kept with strict guardrails

Voice in finance has to be constrained, and Monk designed Voice Collections around that from the start. The agent is read-only on the phone. It answers questions, confirms details, and routes the next step. It will not rewrite an invoice, change a payment status, or accept a sensitive payment change by voice.

The agent is also reference-based. If a caller asks about an invoice, Julia asks for both the company name and the invoice number before looking anything up, and it will not search broadly from a single detail. Every inbound and outbound call is kept in the collection record alongside the email history, so a callback is part of the same thread the team already sees, and anything that needs judgment escalates to a person.

“Voice in finance has to be careful by design,” said Joe Zhou, Co-Founder and CTO of Monk. “Julia will not browse across accounts or move money over the phone. A caller has to bring the company name and invoice number before it confirms anything, and every call lands in the record. In finance a 1% mistake is still unacceptable, so we built for that first and added the reach second.”

Teams run autonomous collections on Monk

Monk runs collections for finance teams at companies like Unify, Pump, Siro, and Elate, and Voice Collections extends what those teams already do by email onto the phone.

“We chose Monk to help automate our collections, a process previously demanding several hours a week of manual, one-off outreach,” said Will Stewart, Head of Finance and BizOps at Unify. “Today, our Monk agent is always running in the background and I have a single dashboard to manage AR from.”

At Pump, which manages volume across more than 1,500 customers, Monk has helped collect over $10 million in recent months.

Voice AI is now infrastructure

The timing reflects how far voice AI has come. It has moved from demo to infrastructure: Vapi has processed more than 1 billion calls, Bland handles over 3.5 million calls a week, and ElevenLabs raised a $500 million round at an $11 billion valuation in early 2026. Monk builds Voice Collections on that foundation and adds the part finance actually needs, which is the AR context, the controls, and the audit trail.

Voice Collections is available now as an opt-in feature. Monk configures the dedicated number and call behavior with each organization before turning it on in Collections. See it in action: https://youtu.be/w09PoN1yACE.

About Monk

Monk is the AI-native accounts receivable platform that helps finance teams turn revenue into cash. Its agent, Julia, runs collections, cash application, and forecasting as one connected system. Monk resolves 88.2% of collections with zero human intervention, reaches customers with a 24% higher response rate than standard dunning, reduces DSO by more than 40%, automatically matches 80% of incoming payments with a full audit trail, and gives finance teams back roughly 26 hours a month. Teams onboard in under a week and see results in their first month. More than $1.5 billion in receivables is managed on the platform, including for customers like Profound and ElevenLabs. Monk has raised $25 million and is based in New York.

Media contact
Kendall Warson
kendall@monk.com
+1 415-827-6585

Sources: Chaser 2026 Accounts Receivable research; Dunwise dunning research; HighRadius collection call cost analysis; University of Chicago Booth field study on AI in recruiting; voice AI figures compiled by Enterprise DNA; Federal Reserve data; Allianz Worldwide DSO survey.

View original content to download multimedia:https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/monk-launches-voice-collections-bringing-ai-phone-calls-and-callbacks-to-accounts-receivable-302833768.html

SOURCE Monk

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