Foreclosure filings fell nearly 18 percent in April in Butler County, but remain higher than at this time last year, according to a California-based firm that tracks such activity.

Realty Trac Inc. said today that filings for default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions in Butler County fell 17.8 percent to 323 filings in April when compared with March. But foreclosure filings rose nearly 4 percent compared to the same month a year ago. In April of 2011, 311 Butler County properties received some kind of foreclosure filing.

The entire Cincinnati region, including Butler County, saw monthly and year-over-year increases in foreclosure activity in April, according to RealtyTrac.

“Both statewide and in Cincinnati we are not seeing the consistent downward trend in overall foreclosure activity that is showing up in Dayton. In both cases, foreclosure activity has been on a bit of a roller-coaster ride over the past few months, decreasing on an annual basis one month (as it did in March) and then increasing the next month (as it did in April),” said Daren Blomquist, spokesman for RealtyTrac.

Last month, a total 1,671 foreclosure filings were made against properties in the 15-county region, up 8.7 percent from the month before and up 26.6 percent from April of last year, also according to the real estate website.

Ohio’s foreclosure filings in April reached 9,768 properties, an increase of 16 percent from March and an increase of 22.7 percent from a year ago.

However, Dayton metro market foreclosure filings dropped almost 44 percent from a year ago to 447 filings. The change there was flat from March.

Information on home sales activity for April is scheduled to be released Tuesday.

Contact this reporter at (513) 705-2551 or clevingston @coxohio.com.