Nationally communities still reeling as foreclosure rates rise and as mortgage defaults and foreclosures continue to rise, the impact is spreading well beyond those who are losing their homes. Fortunately majority of Texas, especially the Austin & san Antonio markets, seem to not be feeling the sub-prime collapse as much as the rest of the nation. The Texas market diversed cities comprised of various industries, business climate and housing growth patterns points to Texas being less effected by the current housing market than any other state in the U.S. God Bless Texas!
In sub-divsions and communities across the nation, national news is reporting that local governments are coping with shrinking tax rolls, lenders are saddled with more foreclosed homes than they can sell and empty homes in many neighborhoods are being abandoned, stripped out, or even vandalized.
Like everything associated with the nation’s housing crisis, the fallout from foreclosures is very local, a fact confirmed by hundreds of e-mails from readers in msnbc.com’s Gut Check America. Some regions appear to have escaped relatively unscathed. But in hard-hit states like California, Arizona and Florida, readers report that some neighborhoods are becoming virtual ghost towns.
In Las Vegas, Nevada, “some subdivisions are three quarters vacant, and lots of homes have been abandoned by their owners, and many people are going into bankruptcy. Parts of California are reporting the same foreclosure rates.
Others report a different kind of isolation; many of those losing their home to foreclosure are reluctant to confide in family or friends until the process is complete. Some neighbors are unsure how to respond while others continue free lawn services on neighboring properties to do everything they can to hold property values.
In Mobile, Alabama, there are many reporting that neighborhoods was dotted with “growing weedy yards, windows with papers taped to them and broken. There are about five or six such homes in my post-World War II subdivision. And these are NOT expensive homes!”
With consumer confidence at a 15 year low there is little help on the horizon nationally, and Texas can only hope to ride out this mortgage crisis before feeling any severe reprecussions of the mortgage fallout.
