Archive for the 'Pennsylvania Articles' Category

Hundreds of properties are being offered at Pittsburgh foreclosure auctions, including properties that can be converted into rental units. This scenario is just one possibility that real estate market analysts are considering after the Housing Alliance of Pennsylvania reported that the state is currently facing a rental housing shortage.

A recent forum held in Cranberry, participated in by the alliance and other housing market experts, explored various suggestions for solving the for-rent property shortage in the state. According to some forum attendees, although home auctions in Pennsylvania offer a lot of properties that can be used as rental houses, enough supply cannot guarantee that the problem of affordability will be solved.

During the forum, representatives from the alliance have stated that renovating rental houses that are already in existence can help solve the rental housing shortage of the state. According to Housing Alliance officials, there is no need to build new rental homes as the stocks are already available and even home foreclosures auctions have enough supplies that can provide the required rental dwellings needed by most cities of Pennsylvania.

However, the main question that forum attendees tried to address has more to do with offering rental dwellings that low income families and state residents can afford and less about lack of property supplies. Pittsburgh foreclosure auctions, for example, have enough houses that can be converted into rental residences. The question is; can these properties, once converted into rental housing by their buyers, offer a rental rate that low income families can afford?

The suggestion by the alliance to focus on existing apartments and rental dwellings was welcomed by most forum attendees since a lot of apartment buildings in the state were built pre-1950s and it would be reasonable to upgrade them to cut down the shortage instead of building new apartments. Most attendees also stated that the state government should focus most of its efforts on helping landlords renovate their units to provide additional rental dwellings to various cities in Pennsylvania.

Furthermore, supporters of the alliance's recommendation stated that renovation projects will provide the state with a lot of economic activities and will offer significant savings. They also added that major cities are in need of subsidized for-rent homes and further assistance for homeowners who have lost their properties to Pittsburgh foreclosure auctions and other city auctions.

A number of homeowners who are facing foreclosures and are about to lose their properties to Philadelphia home auctions were allegedly targeted by Gennaro Rauso, former owner of D&B Property Investors, a firm that specializes in providing real estate management services.

According to information filed against Rauso, the former owner of D&B allegedly took advantage of homeowners who were facing the possibility of losing their homes to Pennsylvania foreclosure auctions by offering services that were supposed to help them retain their properties. Documents filed against Rauso claimed that this was not actually true and that the 46-year-old man actually used homeowners to take money from mortgage lenders.

Allegations against Rauso claimed that he targeted homeowners who were about to lose their properties to a foreclosed home auction and offered them assistance in fighting mortgage lenders, while rebuilding their credit status at the same time. The scheme was allegedly run between 2005 and 2008.

In addition to these claims, he supposedly told homeowners who already lost their properties to Philadelphia home auctions and to foreclosures in other areas of the state that he can help them stay in their homes for more than a year even though their properties have already been auctioned off.

Once homeowners accept the offer, Rauso allegedly asked them to transfer their home titles to his name for a certain amount of fee. He then presented them with a lease document that they would need to sign so that they can be tenants in their own homes but had to pay rent to Rauso himself. He allegedly delayed the process of foreclosure by using various strategies, including filing petitions for federal bankruptcies. While the foreclosure is being held back, he continues to collect rent from the troubled homeowners.

Local authorities have stated that Rauso had spent nine years in prison for a drug-related charge. They revealed that numerous complaints have been filed against him before, but there was never enough evidence so he was never charged. Recently, Rauso's scheme of taking advantage of homeowners facing the possibility of losing their homes to Philadelphia home auctions and to foreclosures in other areas of Pennsylvania has merited enough proof for a charge.

The Pennsylvania county of York is not as battered by foreclosures as other counties in Florida and California, but the number of houses entering home auction lists in the county has been increasing.

According to data gathered by nonprofit Housing Alliance as it conducts counseling for distressed homeowners, the most common reasons cited by borrowers for their defaults and impending foreclosures were loss of income, reduction of income, major medical expenses and increase in the home loan amount.

The reasons cited by the others were death in the family, business failure, divorce and poor financial management.

York housing counselors said that job loss is the strongest factor for foreclosures in the county, and not adjustable-rate mortgage loans or other exotic mortgage loans or poor financial decision making.

Foreclosure auctions in York are also not concentrated in certain areas, unlike in other counties, where there are foreclosure hotbeds, according to The York Dispatch.

Nevertheless, there are areas where there are more foreclosures, according to data from the Sheriff’s Department. Zip code 899, which covers West York, North York and parts of York, currently has 899 foreclosure filings while zip code 17403, which covers York City and certain surrounding areas, has 667 filings. Zip code 17331, which covers Hanover, has 345 filings.

Across the county, the number of houses ready for sheriff sale rose to 1,273 units in 2008, an increase of 80.3 percent from 706 units in 2005. Using the 2005 to 2008 pace would bring a total of 1,412 foreclosed units in 2009.

Over the last 4 years, the number of houses sold at sheriff sales rose to 542 units in 2008, an increase of 55.3 percent from 349 units in 2005. Using the 2005 to 2008 pace would bring total sheriff sales to 696 units in 2009.

Another concern of York officials and residents is the proposal by Harley-Davidson, one of the York’s biggest employers, to relocate work from its Springettsbury factory to another plant in another state. If this happens, according to York real estate executive Patricia Carey, around 2,000 residents would lose their jobs and many of them would lose their homes too.

Last year, large numbers of York County residents applied for state emergency loans to keep up with their monthly loan payments. York is seventh in a ranking of 67 Pennsylvania counties based on the number of applications filed for emergency loans under the Homeowners Emergency Mortgage Assistance Program from the Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency.

The city of Philadelphia is being looked upon by other cities as a model for its foreclosure prevention program, but despite the city’s esteemed efforts, it has not prevented the rise in evictions that resulted from recent foreclosed home auctions.

In Pennsylvania, 37,000 homeowners got their foreclosure notices last year making a 127 percent increase from ‘07 and 50 percent more than the national average. Of these, 10,800 went into repossession, almost twice of 2007’s 5,500.