Foreclosure1 Blog

A Legislative Study Committee came to a consensus that something should be done for those foreclosure victims who unwittingly walked into it. But they drew their line when it came to speculators who are being similarly affected.

The Committee resolved to fund a toll free hotline for troubled house owners as the problem was that most of the foreclosure victims did not know whom to turn to for help. According to statistics about 29,000 houses in Clark County are pending foreclosure sales. Half of them are vacant indicating that these units were purchased by speculators.

For nine consecutive months Nevada has been topping the foreclosure ranks across the country with one foreclosure filing for every 185 houses in September. Experts are gloomy in their predictions that thing will be worsening in the next 18 months. A huge number of sub-prime mortgages are poised just ready to make the big jump towards higher interest rates within few months. According to HUD 15,800 have reached the pre-foreclosure status in Nevada. 11,700 units have already been foreclosed. Most of these are in Clark County.

In Lyon County the picture is even bleaker with 46 foreclosed houses and 86 more hovering in so some stage or the other of the foreclosure process.

Against such a grim backdrop all at the convention agreed that setting up a hotline would be best initial move. The cost would be about $400,000 inclusive of the payment made to the staff who would guide the foreclosure victims through the various options and then connect them with the right points of redress. Nevada’s Consumer Credit Counseling Services spokesperson, Johnson, feels that funds are urgently required. Unfortunately the Federal Government has of late cut back funds for credit counseling from $281,000 in 2006 to $81,000 in 2007. But simultaneously the number of house owners seeking help from the jaws of foreclosures has increased by 2,000 since the previous year.

Another suggestion has been the opening of a website and already progress is being made in this respect. The main idea is to help the needy.

Other legislators feel that the first priority is to sift the speculators from those who bought houses to set up homes. The next thing is to find out the category of these loans – whether they are sub-prime or prime loans. Time and action is of great importance today and now.

Via