Michigan Pre-Foreclosures Up 20% Despite May Dip

Michigan’s Pre-Foreclosure Rates in 2025 Signal Ongoing Struggles for Homeowners

A Rising Tide Despite a Monthly Dip

In May 2025, Michigan recorded 906 homes in pre-foreclosure—a figure that represents more than a statistic. Behind those numbers are families overwhelmed by rising costs, stagnant wages, and mounting debt. Although this marked a 12.97% decline from April’s 1,041 homes, it’s still 20.47% higher than the same time last year, when 752 properties faced pre-foreclosure.

The monthly drop might seem reassuring at first glance, a momentary sigh in what feels like an unrelenting crisis. But the annual rise tells a different story—one of accumulating pressure on struggling households, particularly low and middle-income families trying to survive in an economy that often leaves them behind.

Families at Risk in an Uneven Recovery

Experts frequently point to Michigan’s resilience in recovering from large-scale economic shocks. Yet for many homeowners—like Yolanda, a single mother in western Michigan—the recovery has been uneven. She lost a second job last winter due to company downsizing, just as her adjustable-rate mortgage recalibrated to a much higher payment. Her story is not an outlier. It’s becoming common.

With housing affordability tightening statewide, more families face foreclosure not because they were irresponsible, but because their incomes can no longer keep pace with the market. Inflation has remained stubborn in critical sectors—groceries, energy, and health care—fueling financial insecurity even among people who are employed full-time.

“People think of foreclosure as something that happens to the unemployed,” said Jeffrey Monroe, a legal aid attorney in Detroit who’s seen a spike in filings this year. “But increasingly, it’s the working poor who are being squeezed.”

The Long Arc of Foreclosure in Michigan

The current pre-foreclosure figures are a far cry from the peak of 118,401 in 2010, during the heart of the national housing crisis. Since then, state and federal policies—including robust foreclosure prevention programs and strengthened consumer protections—have steadily reduced the number of at-risk homes.

By 2016, pre-foreclosures in Michigan dropped to just 4,923, a stunning fall from the housing crisis peak. But the downward trend has not held. After a period of missing or incomplete data from 2017 through 2022, the numbers reemerged in 2023, when 12,777 homes entered pre-foreclosure—a sign that hardship persists below the surface of economic headlines touting recovery and growth.

In 2024, the total fell slightly to 10,520, potentially suggesting some stabilization. Yet already in 2025, Michigan has seen 3,829 pre-foreclosures in just the first five months. At this pace, the year may end with over 9,000 cases—undermining hopes that the crisis is receding.

The Missing Maps: A Lack of Local Data

Though the statewide data offers an important glimpse into the magnitude of the problem, it doesn’t tell us where the crisis is hitting hardest. Without county or city breakdowns, we can’t tell how many cases are hitting historically vulnerable areas like Detroit, Flint, or Benton Harbor—or whether the crunch is starting to reach more affluent suburbs.

What is certain is that thousands of families, many of them in cities with underfunded social services and dwindling legal aid support, are navigating housing court alone, often unaware of the options or relief programs available to them.