Thursday, September 30, 2010

Roseland Heights and the house with plywood

The house with the plywood on the front window near 95th & Michigan
It was mentioned at Tuesday's meeting about a couple of houses on the block between Michigan and Wabash on 95th Street. You might have seen a pic of one of them here from around the time of the primary election. One of these houses has plywood for front windows.

I've had my eye on this house with the plywood during the summer. One there was a plastic container top in one of the windows that had gang markings written on it. It struck me as inviting trouble.

I also had no idea that squatters were living there. It was also said that they're stealing electricity.When the Roseland Heights residents mentioned that I recalled that there was a satellite dish on the roof!

It's unclear to me if that house was under foreclosure. It would've been my assumption that the place was being rented by a largely absentee landlord who didn't care that the house was falling into disrepair. Also that the grass wasn't being cut.

If the house was under foreclosure surely there are remedies in place that would help keep that house secured. Ald. Lyle said we need to go after those financial institutions that just sit on these foreclosed properties and write them tickets. The question here is what exactly is the punishment. Can the city take the property away from the financial institution or can they force them to sell?

One thing is for certain that house with the plywood needs to be under the ownership of someone who will take care of this place.

1 comment:

  1. LJ, the foreclosure situation in the 6th ward as well on the south and west sides has become crucial.

    We have the problem where no one wants to be the bad guy. The lenders don't want to foreclose because it makes their financial standings suffer and can trigger asset calls by the FDIC.
    So they are stalling and drawing out the process for as long as they can.

    The owners do not want foreclosure because it hurts their credit but on many of the worst properties it can also mean serious legal problems. Many of the owners financed these properties as "owner occupied" and have numerous properties financed this way. If the properties go into foreclosure it can trigger an avalanche where property after property will start to go into foreclosure and catch the eye of regulators.

    So the owners are placing anybody with money into these properties so they can keep the property avalanche from occuring. Even when they are getting notices from CHA and neighbors they don't care.

    Until the city and FHA get an intergovermental agreement it won't help ticketing.

    ReplyDelete

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