After posting a 75-month low in April, foreclosure filings increased 2 percent in May, according to RealtyTrac. The rise was primarily driven by an 11 percent increase in REOs over the month.

However, REOs demonstrated a 29 percent decline year-over-year in May, while foreclosure filings fell 28 percent over the same time period.

“Foreclosure activity continued to bounce back in some markets where it may have appeared the foreclosure problem had been knocked out by an aggressive combination of foreclosure prevention efforts over the past two years,” said Daren Blomquist, VP at RealtyTrac.

Blomquist pointed to Nevada and Maryland, where foreclosure starts climbed to 20-month and 33-month highs, respectively, in May.

However, he quelled any alarmist views by adding that “the emerging housing recovery has strengthened most local markets enough to quickly shake off a few more blows from these nagging foreclosures.”

Foreclosures were highest in judicial states. In fact, five of the top six foreclosure rates occurred in judicial states with Nevada as the outlier.

Florida, Nevada, and Ohio filled the top three spots on the list of states with highest foreclosure rates in May.

Florida displaced Nevada as the state with the highest foreclosure rate in May after a 20 percent rise over the month. One in every 302 homes in Florida received a foreclosure filing in May. This compares to a national average of one in every 885 homes.

Nevada fell to the No. 2 spot in May with one in every 305 homes receiving foreclosure filings. Nevada’s foreclosure rate broke a 27-month streak of declines, increasing 1.44 percent year-over-year.

The overall increase in Nevada was driven by an 81 percent increase in foreclosure starts.

“[T]he 20-month high in foreclosure starts in May could provide some limited relief to the shortage of inventory as those foreclosure starts translate into short sales, sales at the public foreclosure auction or possibly bank-owned sales over the next year,” said Craig King, COO at Chase International Brokerage.

Ohio fell into the No. 3 spot on the list of states with the highest foreclosure rates in May. The state has held the same spot for two consecutive months now.

One in every 584 homes in Ohio received foreclosure filings in May, which is a decline from both last month and last year.

When comparing large metropolitan areas, RealtyTrac found six of the top 10 foreclosure rates took place in Florida metros. Miami and Jacksonville claimed the top two spots.

One in every 209 homes in Miami received foreclosure filings in May, and one in every 225 homes in Jacksonville received foreclosure filings.