Household debt grew 2.6% as CFPB dashboards showed stronger mortgage and card originations
Household and nonprofit debt increased at a 2.6% seasonally adjusted annual rate in the first quarter of 2026, reaching $21.1 trillion, according to the Federal Reserve. Mortgage debt and nonmortgage consumer credit both continued to grow moderately.
A July update to Consumer Financial Protection Bureau dashboards showed stronger year-over-year origination activity in mortgages and credit cards, while auto-loan growth was more modest. The product snapshots use different reporting months, so they should not be read as a single current-month total.
Mortgages and credit cards posted the largest annual gains
The CFPB counted 468,298 mortgage originations in December 2025 with a combined value of $181.6 billion. The number of originations was 22.5% higher than a year earlier.
The credit-card dashboard recorded 8.6 million new cards with $46.5 billion in aggregate credit limits in December, a 15.6% year-over-year increase in originations.
Auto lending grew more slowly
The auto-loan dashboard showed 2.2 million loans totaling $69.9 billion in December, with originations up 1.8% from a year earlier.
Hard-credit inquiries were down year over year in April across all three products: 0.2% for mortgages, 7.6% for credit cards and 5.6% for auto loans. CFPB says its dashboards draw from a nationally representative sample of credit records and are updated monthly, but the most recent months remain subject to reporting lags and revision.
Sources
- Consumer Credit Trends, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
- Mortgages Consumer Credit Trends Dashboard, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
- Credit Cards Consumer Credit Trends Dashboard, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
- Auto Loans Consumer Credit Trends Dashboard, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
- Financial Accounts of the United States, Recent Developments, Federal Reserve Board
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