County Seeks Ways To Ease Foreclosure Crisis

BROOKSVILLE - The county property appraiser's office recorded 1,928 foreclosures in 2007, more than a 250 percent increase from 2006.
Many times, these abandoned homes are not maintained and are magnets for criminals and present safety concerns.
The sheriff's office, code enforcement and mosquito control office have confirmed the number of calls from residents reporting problems has increased. Withlacoochee River Electric Cooperative and Hernando County Utilities have noticed a large increase in disconnections due to delinquent payments.
Aware of the problem, county commissioners on Tuesday brainstormed ways to ease the foreclosure crisis that continues to hurt the local economy.
There were no votes but they came up with several recommendations, including creating a fund to be used strictly to pay to maintain the properties in foreclosure and in violation of county codes. But there would be no legal remedy to ensure those funds would ever be reimbursed to the county, according to County Code Enforcement Director Frank McDowell.
As Realtor Gary Schraut said: "People just need to come forward and say I need help."
The banks do not want these properties back, McDowell said. They would rather people stay in their homes, keep them maintained and find relief from their hardships.
McDowell also said the building department has the authority to secure vacant homes to avoid safety problems by repairing or replacing pool screen enclosures.
McDowell said his department, when it learns of a property in violation of a foreclosure action, can contact the lienholder and advise him of the problem.
The lienholder can then petition the court for authority to spend money to bring the property into compliance, he said.
McDowell said the code enforcement officials will also monitor the homes until the foreclosure has been resolved and the property brought into compliance.
He also urged homeowners to talk to their banks and lending institutions to get financial advice before things get too far along.
"Please get involved on the front end if you're having some kind of trouble and try to get help," McDowell said.
Last November, county commissioners asked staffers to meet with builders, Realtors, sheriff's officials and others to come up with ways to ease the property foreclosure crisis in Hernando County.
Commissioner Diane Rowden, who spearheaded the effort, said the vast number of vacant homes posed a threat to the health and safety of residents.
Interim County Administrator Larry Jennings said he was pleased by the level of concern from all stakeholders at the meetings and one thing most everyone agreed on was to try to prevent foreclosures from ever starting.
A foreclosure can take up to 18 months from start to finish. During that time, the lender cannot legally take action to maintain the property without a court order. Some nonlocal lenders may not be motivated to take such action, Jennings said.
Even though assistance is available to help people with foreclosures, many don't avail themselves of those opportunities until it's too late in the process, he added.
Many of the properties in foreclosure could be sold if potential buyers received down payment assistance, said Community Relations Director Brenda Frazier.
Frazier cited the need for legislators to release to local governments a portion of the down-payment assistance funds currently being held in the state housing trust fund for distribution to homeowners.
To date, more than $500 million sits in that state fund, called the Sadowski Trust Fund.
But the Florida Legislature froze that money, which is normally distributed to Hernando County in the form of its State Housing Initiatives Partnership (SHIP) funds and allocated to people who qualify for down payment assistance for new homes.
Other ideas discussed Tuesday to ease the foreclosure crisis include:
 Notifying banks of the availability of the court order process so code enforcement officers can obtain access to the property sooner to clean it up.
 Develop a brochure for homeowners with tips on how to prevent foreclosure. There are also plans to sponsor a free seminar to inform owners of their options if they face financial distress.
 Produce a program for the local government channel making viewers aware of assistance before they find themselves in a foreclosure situation.
 Alert legislators of the need to speed up the process for banks to secure nonhomestead properties earlier in the foreclosure process so they can keep the viability of the property.
 Advise banks and lenders of the court order process for obtaining property access for maintenance purposes rather than waiting sometimes more than a year for the foreclosure process to be complete.