2026 FORECLOSURE SURGE CREATES A NEW WAVE OF PROPERTY OPPORTUNITY

More properties are moving through America’s foreclosure pipeline, REO completions are climbing, and specialized marketplaces such as Fannie Mae HomePath are becoming increasingly important places to search. UX has built the door that connects them.

The 104-acre Table Rock Lake estate in Branson West, Missouri, includes an approximately 33,000-square-foot unfinished residence and more than 1,700 feet of shoreline.

Nobody enjoys talking about foreclosures. Nobody wants to see a family lose a home or a business lose its footing. But life brings hard moments, and when lenders or government agencies must reclaim a property, they follow the systems designed to keep housing markets stable and functioning. Understanding those systems doesn’t erase the human side — but it does help us talk about the subject with clarity. And once we understand how the process works, we can see the other side of the story: the moment when these properties re-enter the public marketplace and become opportunities for new buyers.

Something meaningful is happening in American real estate in 2026.

Properties are moving.

According to ATTOM’s Mid-Year 2026 U.S. Foreclosure Market Report, 227,548 properties received foreclosure filings during the first six months of 2026, an increase of 21% from the first half of 2025 and 28% from the same period in 2024.

Foreclosure starts increased 18% year over year.

Completed foreclosures increased 33%.

And properties completing foreclosure during the second quarter spent an average of 563 days in the process — the shortest average foreclosure timeline ATTOM has reported since 2013.

For buyers searching beyond the traditional retail real-estate market, those numbers deserve attention.

They represent a growing stream of properties moving through foreclosure, auction, REO and eventually back toward the marketplace.

And that is where the story gets interesting.

FROM FORECLOSURE TO OPPORTUNITY

Foreclosure statistics usually appear in stories about the people leaving properties.

There is another side of the transaction.

Eventually, many of those properties have another owner.

A completed foreclosure can result in a property becoming REO, or Real Estate Owned. Depending upon the mortgage and institution involved, that property may eventually be marketed by a bank, Fannie Mae, HUD or another organization.

Some properties are sold earlier in the process. Others reach public auction. Still others eventually become REO and are offered through established real-estate channels.

For buyers, this creates another source of housing inventory to discover.

And in 2026, more properties are reaching that stage.

ATTOM reported 27,983 completed foreclosures during the first six months of the year, 33% more than during the same period in 2025.

That is nearly 28,000 properties reaching the end of foreclosure in only six months.

The opportunity isn’t simply the number of properties.

It’s knowing where they go next.

FLORIDA SHOWS THE SCALE

Few places illustrate the changing market better than Florida.

ATTOM reported 20,358 foreclosure starts in Florida during the first half of 2026, placing it among the states with the largest number of new foreclosure proceedings in the country.

Florida also recorded 2,070 completed foreclosures during the period.

The state’s combination of a huge housing market, continued population movement and substantial property activity makes it particularly interesting for buyers searching specialized property channels.

Every property is different. Every local market is different.

But increasing activity means there is more reason to look beyond conventional real-estate searches.

A property might appear through a traditional real-estate brokerage.

Another might become REO.

Another could eventually appear through a specialized marketplace.

The person who knows how to search across those different sources has access to a much wider view of the market.

That’s exactly where UX enters the picture.

HOMEPATH: ANOTHER DOOR INTO THE MARKET

One of the most important specialized property sources in the United States is Fannie Mae HomePath.

Fannie Mae has been part of American housing since 1938. Today it remains one of the central institutions supporting the country’s secondary mortgage market.

When Fannie Mae acquires certain properties through the foreclosure process, those properties can become part of its REO inventory.

Fannie Mae markets its available REO properties through HomePath.com.

For buyers, that creates a national marketplace dedicated specifically to Fannie Mae-owned properties.

HomePath also provides features intended to encourage homeownership. Fannie Mae’s First Look program gives eligible owner-occupants, public entities and certain nonprofit organizations an initial opportunity to pursue qualifying properties before investor competition opens more broadly.

Eligible first-time buyers of HomePath properties may also qualify for closing-cost assistance through Fannie Mae’s HomePath Ready Buyer program after completing the required homeownership education.

HomePath isn’t a conventional auction platform.

And that is precisely why it belongs within the UX search universe.

Government and government-connected opportunities don’t all arrive through an auctioneer.

Sometimes the opportunity is sitting on a specialized real-estate website that a buyer simply didn’t know existed.

HOMEPATH IS ONLY THE BEGINNING

The American government-connected real-estate market extends far beyond Fannie Mae.

HUD has its own property-disposition system for HUD-owned homes resulting from FHA-insured mortgages.

USDA maintains property resources associated with its programs.

GSA handles federal real property.

State governments dispose of surplus real estate.

Counties and municipalities sell property.

Financial institutions maintain REO inventories.

Public auctions create still another source.

Each system represents another potential place to discover property.

Taken together, they create an enormous national market.

The difficulty is that the market doesn’t have one front door.

UX has built that door.

WHY UX BUILT REAL-ESTATE SEARCH

UX began with online auctions.

The idea was straightforward: instead of searching auction website after auction website looking for a vehicle or piece of equipment, create technology capable of helping users search across the relevant sources.

Real estate presents the same problem on an even larger scale.

A buyer shouldn’t have to understand the entire relationship among Fannie Mae, FHA, HUD, USDA, GSA, REO departments and government property programs simply to begin searching.

That’s why UXSearch.app and the real-estate research tools integrated throughout UXAuctions.com are important.

We help users find HomePath, HUD, and federal, state, and local property sources without needing to know every website in advance.

That is a fundamentally different approach.

SEARCH THE PROPERTY, NOT THE BUREAUCRACY

Traditional government property research can require knowing which organization owns or controls the asset before you know where to search for it.

UX reverses that process.

Begin with the property, the location, and what you want to find.

Our 50-state property resources on UXAuctions.com provide another geographic path into the market, allowing users to begin with the state they’re interested in rather than first identifying the government program behind a property.

Then UXSearch.app expands the search across targeted sources.

And once a user finds something interesting, the AI Search available through the UXAuctions.com Personalized Workspace provides another layer for researching the terminology, agency, program or property category involved.

Search finds the opportunity.

Research helps explain it.

The original source handles the listing.

227,548 PROPERTIES DEMONSTRATE WHY SEARCH MATTERS

The most important lesson from ATTOM’s 2026 numbers isn’t simply that foreclosure filings increased 21%.

It’s the scale.

227,548 properties in six months.

164,566 foreclosure starts.

27,983 completed foreclosures.

563 days on average for properties completing foreclosure during the second quarter.

And that’s only the foreclosure market.

Add Fannie Mae-owned properties, HUD-owned homes, USDA properties, federal real estate, state surplus property, county property, municipal real estate, public auctions and bank REO, and the searchable universe becomes considerably larger.

There is no shortage of information.

There is a shortage of simple ways to find it all.

A DIFFERENT KIND OF BUYER’S MARKET

Opportunity means buyers have more places to look.

A buyer who searches only conventional listings sees one portion of the market.

A buyer who also understands HomePath, HUD properties, government real estate, public auctions and REO sees more.

And a buyer with technology capable of searching across those sources has an even broader view.

That is the opportunity UX is building around.

Giving people the ability to see more of the market for themselves.

THE PUBLIC MARKETPLACE IS GETTING BIGGER

Vehicles brought us into government auctions.

Heavy equipment demonstrated the enormous scale of public asset sales.

Real estate takes the same concept into an entirely different category.

The UX ecosystem now connects targeted search, government-auction research, closed-auction information, original reporting, market news, AI-powered research, 50-state property resources and the Digital Magazine.

The asset can change completely without changing the underlying mission.

A Ford Police Interceptor.

A Caterpillar excavator.

A generator.

Federal surplus.

A Fannie Mae-owned house.

A piece of government real estate.

The question remains the same:

Can we help our users find it?

The answer is yes using UXAuctions.com.

2026 IS CREATING MORE TO SEARCH

ATTOM’s numbers tell us that America’s foreclosure pipeline is becoming more active and properties are moving through that pipeline faster than they have in years.

HomePath shows us one place where part of the resulting REO inventory can eventually reach buyers.

HUD represents another.

Government property programs create still more.

UX brings the discovery process together.

More information. More sources. More properties to discover.

The opportunity isn’t simply finding a lower price.

The opportunity is knowing where to look.

UX — SEARCH. RESEARCH. FIND THE SOURCE.

“The opportunity is knowing where to look.”

UX Auctions Magazine — September 2026

Key Figures

227,548

Properties receiving foreclosure filings during the first six months of 2026

21%

Increase from the first half of 2025

27,983

Completed foreclosures during the first six months of 2026

563 DAYS

Average foreclosure timeline for properties completing foreclosure during the second quarter

UX Auctions Magazine

September 2026 • Issue 01

FEATURED PROPERTY

Our UX Auctions News team is onsite in Branson West, Missouri, covering the upcoming online auction of the massive unfinished mansion formerly owned by Major League Baseball pitcher Cole Hamels.

The 104-acre lakefront estate at 2866 State Highway DD in Branson West is scheduled for online auction beginning September 17, with bidding scheduled to close at 11 a.m. September 24 through Target Auctions.

The property includes more than 1,700 feet of shoreline along Table Rock Lake and an approximately 33,000-square-foot unfinished smart home.

The residence includes large wood beams and a resort-style beach-entry infinity pool overlooking Table Rock Lake.

The estate also includes a separate five-bedroom, six-bathroom guest residence with approximately 3,600 square feet of living space and a three-car garage, along with detached RV and boat storage.

In 2017, the Hamels family donated the property to Camp Barnabas. The property was later sold and eventually entered foreclosure.

The online auction is being conducted through Target Auctions.