U.S. sales of distressed homes totaled 11.1% of all homes sold in April of this year, according to data from CoreLogic and published Thursday on the company’s blog. The total represents a three-point drop compared with April of 2014 and a drop of 1.5% compared with March of this year.

A distressed sale is a transaction involving a real estate-owned (REO) property or a short sale. In April, REO sales accounted for 7.4% of all home sales, and short sales accounted for 3.7% of all sales in the month. At the peak of distressed sales in January 2009, 32.4% of all sales were distressed, including REO sales totaling 27.9% of all sales.

The CoreLogic report noted:

The ongoing shift away from REO sales is a driver of improving home prices since bank-owned properties typically sell at a larger discount than short sales. There will always be some amount of distress in the housing market, and by comparison, the pre-crisis share of distressed sales was traditionally about 2 percent. If the current year-over-year decrease in distressed sales share is maintained, the distressed sales share would reach that “normal” 2-percent mark in mid-2017.

The five states with the largest percentage of distressed sales were Michigan (21.7%), Florida (21.7%), Maryland (19.9%), Illinois (19.8%) and Connecticut (19.3%). Only North Dakota and the District of Columbia remain within one point of their respective pre-crisis distressed sales shares. Nevada had a 7.7-point drop in its distressed sales share from a year earlier, the largest decline of any state, and California had the largest improvement of any state from its peak distressed sales share, falling 57.8 points from its January 2009 peak of 67.5%.

Among the 25 largest metropolitan areas, these five posted the largest percentage of distressed sales:

• Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford, Fla., (24.7%)
• Miami-Miami Beach-Kendall, Fla., (23.8%)
• Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, Fla., (23.2%)
• Chicago-Naperville-Arlington Heights, Ill., (22.5%)
• Baltimore-Columbia-Towson, Md., (19.8%).

Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell, Ga., had the largest year-over-year drop in its distressed share, falling by 8.3 points from 23.5% in April 2014 to 15.2% in April 2015.

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