KeNo's Housing and Economic Portal: Thursday August 4 Housing and Economic stories

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Thursday August 4 Housing and Economic stories

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Canadians mow grass, then own property next door - (www.toledoblade.com) A few Sandusky landowners will soon come to own the abandoned grassy plots beside their homes -- as long as they or their tenants mow the lawn long enough to earn them. Under Sandusky's new Mow to Own program -- believed to be unusual in Ohio -- homeowners living next to properties that are abandoned but made useless by zoning laws can take care of the land for up to two years, until the value of their maintenance matches the parcel's value. Then they own the city-owned land for good. "There's a lot of maintenance that we've had to do, so [the program] will free our people up to take care of city property," said Sandusky chief planner Carrie Handy. The program, which takes effect in August could eventually relieve the city's maintenance cost for dozens of "unbuildable" parcels while letting adjacent homeowners add the land to their properties and increase their home values. The plan could be especially effective in Sandusky, a city that is home to hundreds of parcels laid out before the spread of the automobile's popularity and lacking driveways and garages.

Irish people question why they should be sacrificed to pay private banker debt - (www.enoughcampaign.org) Richard Boyd Barrett TD today congratulated the people of Iceland for their leadership on resisting the power the bankers: “The result of the Icelandic referendum is a fantastic example of people power. For the second time in just over a year the people of Iceland have stood up to their politicians, defied the threats of international bankers, financers and governments, and issued a second resounding ‘No’ to a deal that would nationalise the €4 billion losses of the failed Icesave bank. Almost one in three Icelandic voters opposed the deal even though seventy percent of the parliament supported paying and the government were opposed to even holding a referendum. “Here in Ireland we are being told that we must put €70 billion into a toxic banking system to compensate gamblers and speculators for their losses. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of people have lost their jobs, tens of thousands are emigrating, people are struggling to repay mortgages and our public services are collapsing.

Foreclosure scammer sentenced for $55M swindle, but Greenspan still free - (www.centralvalleybusinesstimes.com) Jeff McGrue, 51, of Tacoma, Wash., who was found guilty in January of swindling California homeowners facing foreclosure, has been sent to prison for up to 25 years for running a foreclosure rescue rip-off. He had promised to prevent foreclosure through the paying off of their mortgages, but in reality doing no more than sending their lenders fake notes and keeping the money the homeowners sent to him, prosecutors say. The evidence presented during a four-day trial in U.S. District Court showed that Mr. McGrue orchestrated the foreclosure-rescue scheme from the fall of 2007 through the fall of 2008 through a company he called “Gateway International.”

Short sale fraud plagues the housing market - (money.cnn.com) Just as the housing market began to collapse near the end of 2007, a real estate agent in Bridgeport, Conn. asked Regions Bank if it would accept a $102,375 bid on a home that was underwater on its mortgage. Under the impression that this was the best offer on the home, Regions agreed to the short sale and released the mortgage it owned on the home. Later that same day, the new owner -- an investment group owned by another real estate agent -- resold the home to a buyer who had been lined up before the short sale transaction went through. The final sale price: $132,500, netting the seller a cool $30,000 -- a profit that should have gone to Regions. In this latest twist on short sale fraud, scammers have found a way to rip off mortgage lenders by tens of thousands of dollars -- sometimes in a matter of hours.

Flash Mobs Battle Spanish Banks to Halt Foreclosures - (www.bloomberg.com) Luis Dominguez got up at dawn to take a 5 a.m. bus to join a human chain around a Madrid home threatened with foreclosure. Three weeks earlier, the crowd had come to him after he telephoned for help. “I was facing eviction and they saved me from losing my home,” said Dominguez, 74, a pensioner with a walking stick in one hand and a five-foot placard saying “Stop Evictions” in the other. “I came today to show my gratitude and support.” The 300 protesters, organized by a group called La Plataforma de los Afectados por la Hipoteca, or PAH, managed to win a reprieve for the property’s owner, a single mother with a disabled son. Rising unemployment in Spain may lead to 300,000 foreclosures this year and next, according to Adicae, a rights group representing bank customers. Spain has become a battleground between banks hurt by a five-fold increase in residential mortgage arrears since 2007 and debt-laden homeowners who are appealing to the government to reduce the burden on those facing foreclosure.