Look at the forclosure filing rates 1 in 142 housholds in Atl, 1 in 61 Nevada, tell me this isnt a problem, man thats horrible. The banks should be shot. I remember you couldnt buy a house unless you could afford it. The banks knew people couldnt afford it, but still gave a these loans, A lot of people are at fault, but the bankers are suppose to be the experts and protect themselves. When I went to build my house they tried to give me more than I wanted or needed and tried some funky loans I said no Fixed rate and that was thatThere was just a lot of real bad business practices and now the country is going to pay for one way or another.
I remember The Savings & Loan crisis. The Bushes were involved in that and now another banking crisis, while Bush is prez Hummmmmmmmmmm Thats my weekly Bush Bashing for now
Like I said, I hope we fair well America
Eighty-five bungalows dot the cul-de-sac that joins West Ontario Avenue and East Ontario Avenue in Atlanta. Twenty-two are vacant, victims of mortgage fraud and foreclosure. Now house fires, prostitution, vandals and burglaries terrorize the residents left in this historic neighborhood called Westview Village.
"It's created a safety hazard. And if we have to sell our house tomorrow, we're out of luck," said resident Scott Smith. "Real estate agents say to me 'We're not redlining you, but I tell my clients to think twice about buying here.'"
As defaults surge on mortgages made to borrowers with spotty credit and adjustable-rate loans, more people are noticing that their neighbors are caught up in the meltdown. Their misfortunes are haunting those left living on the same streets. The effects aren't confined to just low-income or redeveloping communities; they are seeping into middle-class neighborhoods and brand new developments.
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Smith, the vice president of Westview Community Organization Inc., keeps a map of the area, tracking each vacant property and notifying local officials when criminal activity is suspected.
Georgia has the eighth largest foreclosure rate in the nation, one filing for every 142 households, according to a third-quarter report from foreclosure tracker RealtyTrac Inc. Nevada has the worst rate with one filing in every 61 households, while the nationwide rate is one filing for every 196 households.
"They've seen a lot of prostitution in the area, vagrants wandering in and out of the empty houses and drug activity," said Officer Dakarta Richardson of the Atlanta Police Department. "Some people that I talked to are afraid to walk out of their homes at night."
Some other people in the area have been affected by break-ins, and there have been house fires in several of the vacant homes in the past year, Richardson said.
The rise in crime in Westview is typical of a neighborhood struggling with numerous foreclosures, according to a recent study by Dan Immergluck of Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta and Geoff Smith of Woodstock Institute in Chicago.
That study showed that when the foreclosure rate increases one percentage point, neighborhood violent crime rises 2.33 percent.
"The key here is the concentration of those foreclosures at a neighborhood level. When you have more than one foreclosure in a few block area, that's when you start to think about the effects on property values and the effects on crime," Immergluck said.
A report published Tuesday by the Center for Responsible Lending, a Durham, N.C.-based consumer advocate, estimates that 44.5 million U.S. households will see their property values decline a combined $223 billion as foreclosures surge in coming years, particularly in minority communities.
Historically the most affected areas were lower-income and were prone to subprime and predatory lending, irresponsible house flipping and mortgage fraud, Immergluck said.
However, "the problem now is on a different scale," he said. "It's affecting a lot more suburban, moderate-income places" as more people of different incomes default on riskier loans.
In the Franklin Reserve neighborhood of Elk Grove, Calif., full of subdivisions with half-million dollar homes, homeowners are fighting inner-city problems like gangs, drugs, theft and graffiti.
During the boom, the suburb just south of Sacramento sprouted 10,000 homes in four years, attracting investors from the San Francisco area. Now many houses stand empty, weeds overtaking lawns, signs lining the street: "Bank Repo," "For Rent," "No trespassing — bank owned property." A typical home's value has dropped from about $570,000 to the low $400,000s.
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California ranks second in the nation with one foreclosure filing for every 88 households, RealtyTrac said.
The homeowners sometimes have no options but to accept any renters they can get, said Norm Schriever, a local real estate and loan agent.
"You get some bad renters in there and the weeds start growing and a few windows are broken and it starts descending into a feeling of chaos," he said.
CONTINUED: "The pot growers, they mow their lawns"
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