Help for Homeowners Facing Foreclosure

November 20, 2008

Everyone seems to agree that flooding the market with empty, foreclosed homes does not help neighborhoods maintain stability – either as a way of living, or regarding the value of homes. Empty homes do nothing for a neighborhood.

Recently some organizations are taking tentative steps to allow homeowners who are defaulting on their mortgage to remain in their homes –at least for the time being.

Fannie and Freddie Mac have announced that they are freezing foreclosure sales until after the new year while they review strategies and the future of their organizations. J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup Inc. recently announced foreclosure-prevention programs that aim to reduce interest rates, extend repayment schedules and, in the case of Citigroup, reduce loan amounts, to help borrowers keep their homes. But the programs have focused primarily on loans wholly owned by those companies because they feel they have more authority to rework those mortgages.

HSBC is also making more options available to more people. For example, it is contacting customers before their adjustable-rate loans reset to higher rates and freezing the current rate or allowing the borrower to pay a rate below what the new rate would be. The bank also is lowering fixed rates for selected borrowers. All this in an effort to stave of foreclosures.

One way of stabilizing markets where supply exceeds demand is to regulate supply. That way the people who can buy homes can buy from sellers who can’t afford to stay in their current home. But, amazingly enough, new home construction is still going on – even in saturated markets. Merrill Lynch economist David Rosenberg suggests, only half-jokingly, that the Treasury should impose a moratorium on home building. "It sounds like lunacy, but we have to destroy the housing capital stock to help put a floor under the market," he said.

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Local Information for Middlebury, VT

Latitude: 44.014153 -- Longitude: -73.163784

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Vermont 2000 Census Population Profile Map

	Middlebury	Vermont	United States
Population	6,252	608,827	281,421,906
Median age	22.7	37.7	35.3
Median age for Male	22.2	36.6	34
Median age for Female	23.6	38.7	36.5
Households	1,876	240,634	105,480,101
Household population	4,030	588,067	273,643,273
Average household size	2.15	2.44	2.59
Families	984	157,763	71,787,347
Average family size	2.9	2.96	3.14
Housing units	1,984	294,382	115,904,641
Occupied units	1,876	240,634	105,480,101
Vacant units	108	53,748	10,424,540

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