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Rapidly rising home values in Denver may be hurting would-be buyers, but they are helping homeowners in a number of ways. One is the extraordinarily low number of mortgagees that exceed the actual value of the home -- fewer than almost anywhere in the country.
Only about 4 percent of mortgages in the Denver metro area are seriously underwater, according to RealtyTrac. That’s just a fraction of the national rate of 12.7 percent and down sharply in a dramatic way from 2013 when nearly one in four homes were seriously underwater. Colorado as a whole is also performing much better than the nation.