California Credit Dashboard

Latest Update: September 4, 2024

• Updated all dashboards with 2024 Q2 data
• Includes new Financial Trends snapshot
• Press release for this update

Charts

Existing credit balances

• Average credit balances
• Total outstanding credit
• Average monthly payments

New loan originations

• Average origination amounts
• Total originations

Financial distress

• Delinquency rates
• Foreclosures
• Auto repossessions

Access to credit

• Credit scores
• Credit-card utilization

Maps

• Delinquency rates
• Credit Scores
• Total originations
• Average origination amounts

Insights

California Financial Trends snapshot

Periodically, the California Policy Lab publishes Data Points highlighting trends in the data or diving deep on a specific issue.

• April 2023 – Startling Increase in California Auto Loans (Data Point | Press Release)
• Dec 2022 – Introducing the CCD  (Data Point | Press Release)

About the California Credit Dashboard

California is the fifth largest economy in the world and has more people than the least populous 22 US states combined. What happens in California affects the world.

Yet to date there has been little information available about household financial balance sheets at the state level. The California Credit Dashboard seeks to fill that gap.

The Dashboard provides measures of financial health for California’s diverse population. What type of debts do they have? How many are delinquent? What is the current pace of originations? How are credit scores faring? Our data come from one of the three nationwide credit bureaus.

We break out data by subgroups so that users can compare different profiles. We currently provide breakdowns by loan types, regions, and age groups. In the future, we hope to provide more breakdowns.

Feedback? Please email creditdashboard@capolicylab.org.

Media coverage and press releases

Los Angeles Times: High interest rates are hurting people. Here’s why it’s worse for Californians (June 28, 2024)

Newsweek: Current Mortgage and Refinance Rates in California Newsweek (June 26, 2024)

MarketWatch: A $114,000 salary makes you feel poorer than your parents. These 6 metrics show why. (June 1, 2024)

Newsweek: California Has a Car Debt Problem (June 3, 2024)

Los Angeles Times: As more Californians fall behind in making debt payments, one group stands out (May 24, 2024)

Los Angeles Times: Why Biden is getting little credit for the economy, especially in California (April 10, 2024)

KPBS: Report: San Diego, Imperial County car loans are getting bigger (April 10, 2023)

Sacramento Bee: Eight million Californians have auto loans, but more and more struggle to pay them off (April 4, 2023)

Capitol Public Radio: Interview with Evan White, co-author of research brief focused on auto loans in California (April, 2023)

Previous press releases:

Q2, 2024 update: Monthly Student Loan Payments Are 40% Lower, Car Loan Amounts Are Down, and Mortgage Amounts Are Up (Sept 2024)

Q1, 2024 update: Delinquencies Decrease Slightly, Credit Scores Increase Slightly, and New Mortgages Up $30,000 (May 2024)

Q4, 2023 update: Dashboard adds New Snapshot of Key Trends – Such as Rising Delinquencies (March 2024)

Q2, 2023 update: California Credit Dashboard Updated with Q2 Data (Nov 2023)

Q1, 2023 update: New Data Finds Dramatic Changes in California’s Mortgage Market Since 2020: Fewer Loans, but Larger Amounts (July 2023)

Q4, 2022 update: New Research Finds Startling Increases in Auto Loans in California (April 2023)

Q3, 2022 update: Introducing the California Credit Dashboard: Insights into the Financial Health of Californians (December 2022)

Changelog

9/4/24:

• Added Q2 2024 data

5/21/24:

• Added Q1 2024 data
• Small bug fixes, including issues with the CA average on some charts

3/22/24:

• Added Q4 2023 data
• Launched Financial Trends snapshot
• Changed credit utilization chart to average consumer-level utilization, rather than population-level utilization.

11/20/23:

• Added Q2 2023 data, and new maps allowing users to plot changes in credit scores, total originations, and per capita originations.

7/27/23:

• Added Q1 2023 data, new chart (monthly payments), and new map features (customizing date ranges and population filters).

4/4/23:

• Added Q4 2022 data, new charts (total originations, foreclosures, repossessions, credit-card utilization), launched first map (delinquencies), new dashboard features (inflation adjustments, filter by credit score buckets).
• Used a 2% subsample, rather than 1%.
• Implemented new method for eliminating tradeline duplicates where two tradelines have different trade keys but all other relevant attributes are the same. This reduced Ns and changed displayed values.

12/21/22:

• Launched Dashboard with five charts: average balances, total outstandings, average originations, 30-day delinquency rates, and average credit scores. Charts had filters by region, generation, and loan type, and a seasonal adjustment option.

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