Foreclosures Ensnaring Tenants Too

September 23rd, 2008

The foreclosure crisis is no longer confined to lenders and the borrowers who are the house owners. Foreclosures are also ensnaring tenants. The nation’s jumbo landlords club together as a trade association known as The National Multi-Housing Council. This group has always been aggressively advocating the spread of the motto that each American should own a house and not live as a tenant. Today this group is up in arms against house owners who, unable to sell off their properties in the foreclosure-ridden market, are quietly renting these units. The council is issuing a warning to all tenants to be alert about the landlord being in foreclosure. If so it will spell danger for them also. The lender of a foreclosed house has no obligations towards a renter.

The council has brought out a brochure detailing a warning to potential tenants. About 40%of all the houses and condos that have been rented out are in foreclosure. The figures have been obtained from RealtyTrac. The tenants are cautioned against the danger of losing their security deposits apart from receiving sudden marching orders.

A website hosted by Baird & Warner Real Estate of Chicago has included a new feature that permits renters to search and find out if the house of their choice are foreclosed or not.

According to the findings of The Lawyer’s Committee for Better Housing approximately 2,500 families who live in rented quarters in Chicago will soon be evicted because of foreclosures before this year draws to a close.

With the rising number of victimized tenants the laws are being bent to adjust to their needs. In some instances the renter gets 90 days notice before shifting out. The help is not much to crow about. This 90 days grace is applicable only to those tenants who are not defaulting in their rental payments.

Desperate measures and innovative steps are being taken to lure buyers into the market. Unless the sales pick up the gloomy clouds of foreclosure will continue to haunt the economy.In Evanston the seller promises few bottles of the best wine (he himself being a wine auctioneer) to the buyer when the buyer moves in to the new house! The seller has an exclusive collection of 200 bottles of wine mainly from France and California. This house-with-the wine is a landmark building in the Ridge – a historic district of Evanston. It has 16 rooms and the asking price is $1.8 million.