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11-20-2008, 07:41 PM #1
Fort Worth to offer $20,000 loans for people buying foreclos
Here is how your federal dollars are being spent and it should upset you.
Fort Worth to offer $20,000 loans for people buying foreclosed houses
By MIKE LEE
mikelee@star-telegram.com
FORT WORTH — City officials are stepping into the housing meltdown, with a plan to use $6.2 million in federal funds to help people buy foreclosed homes in areas that have been hit the hardest.
The money, from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Neighborhood Stabilization Program, is aimed at areas with high rates of foreclosures and subprime mortgages.
Targeted areas are mainly outside Loop 820, which saw a lot of development in recent years.
The City Council is scheduled to vote on a spending plan during today’s meeting. Several other area cities received similar funds, as did Tarrant County.
Unlike some other local governments, which want to buy foreclosed homes outright, Fort Worth plans to loan the money in $20,000 increments. Buyers will be able to use the funds for down payments, closing costs and repairs.
About $5.6 million would go for loans and the rest for overhead.
"Our goal is to get more property into the hands of homeowners," said Jerome Walker, the city’s housing director.
If the borrowers stay in the home for five years, the city can forgive the loan.
About half the money is targeted at low-income families (less than $32,300 for four people), and the rest at people making up to 120 percent of the area median ($77,500).
The money will provide about 280 loans. Fort Worth had 3,780 foreclosures from September 2007 to October 2008.
"It only begins to address the problem," Walker said.
The Housing and Community Development Department has recommended that the loans be concentrated in seven ZIP codes generally in newer areas outside Loop 820, which accounted for 49 percent of the foreclosures in the last year.
For example, ZIP code 76248, which is bounded by Interstate 35W, North Tarrant Parkway and Alliance Gateway, had 341 foreclosures.
According to the city, the homes are middle class, with an average size of 1,909 square feet and an average value of $120,000.
Walker said he isn’t surprised that foreclosures have been concentrated in newly built areas.
"That’s where the sales were happening," he said. "Typically, if you’re going to have a foreclosure, it’s going to happen in first five years."
MIKE LEE, 817-390-7539
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11-20-2008, 08:18 PM #2
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- Jul 2008
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I live about a mile from the mentioned areas. My brother lives in one. I worked for a real estate company (until they went down) that had many California investors that bought many of those homes to use for lease properties. Here in Texas, a $140,000 home would could easily sell for $500,000 in California, so they expected a large monthly profit. Well they found out that here in Ft Worth that you can't lease a $1100 a month home for $1650, so they began to drop the prices which ultimately made them lose money every month. The neighborhood my brother lives in is 65% investor owned and MANY are now foreclosed on.
We see so many tribes overrun and undermined
While their invaders dream of lands they've left behind
Better people...better food...and better beer...
Why move around the world when Eden was so near?
-Neil Peart from the song Territories&
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