Posted on 03/27/2024 6:07:46 AM PDT by dynachrome
Baltimore, Maryland, city officials approved a program that would sell city-owned vacant homes for next to nothing at $1 for some applicable residents.
According to the Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD), the Fixed Pricing Program was created to combat the more than 13,500 homes in Baltimore that are vacant.
City officials said Tuesday that just over 200 homes are currently in the program.
According to the DHCD, the homes would only be sold to individuals who are willing to invest their money in fixing the dilapidated homes.
Applicants must provide proof that they have at least $90,000 to complete a renovation, as well as pass through an application vetting process.
Interested parties can apply beginning April 1.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxbusiness.com ...
Yeah... a derelict house in Baltimore? I live out west. Is this some kind of east coast insider humor?
…and pay all of the back taxes owed, too.
Detroit tried this but they expected buyers to payoff the back taxes.
You see it’s only $1. Well its actually $90,001. Well actually there is 15 years of backed taxes.
been saying this was the solution for years.
You don’t build NEW housing for the homeless, you let them buy the properties the city has foreclosed on instead of selling them to investors on the courthouse steps
Sounds good at first blush, but when parsed-—it is just NOISE.
How much in taxes for a house worth $1???
*** the homes would only be sold to individuals who are willing to invest their money in fixing the dilapidated homes. ****
I bought an acreage that was listed at $175000 back in 1989. The people could not sell it so walked away from it. Within a month vandals and scrappers hit it tearing it to pieces. We got it very cheap, but it took us 5 years to make it livable as my wife and I did all the repair work ourselves. When we finally moved in in 1994 we were debt free in a 2800 sq ft house on 15 acres.
It also had a once nice in ground swimming pool but when I drained it, I found it so shot full of holes, and repair costs from a pool repair place would have made it’s repair almost as much as a new pool, I had it filled in.
“newcomer migrants”. it will probably be a better house than some of them left to invade the US.
I remember an old scam from decades ago in which people were sold very cheap homes. Once the deal was made the County would hit them with very high PROPERTY TAXES. Very high!
Didn’t baltimore do this in the early 1980s? I wonder these are the same houses renovated and then trashed again.
That judge in New York, Engoron, did the Valuation on the homes. He’s his own expert on home values.
wouldn’t drop a good Texas turd in Baltimore, much less a dollar.
US Citizens with a family and job need not apply, this Illegal Alienism 101.
Really? Squatters should flock to Baltimore. That would be funny.
We have 10 Million Illegal Aliens who can move in if you give them money.
I’ve seen those areas where these houses are. It’s a terrible shame. You can see from their architecture that they were once owned by wealthy people and were lovely. Today, they have broken windows, garbage-strewn yards, roofs caving in, etc. People sit on their stoops during normal working hours, smoking and hanging out amid piles of garbage. It would cost nothing to pick up that garbage and dispose of it, but they are too lazy to do so. All that housing absolutely being wasted. About one in three of the houses are inhabited, the rest are abandoned wrecks.
I took the AMTRACK from D.C. to NYC last week, something I had not done for five years. The train passes through the worst parts of Baltimore, with block after block of abandoned row houses, all boarded up and in horrible condition on either side of the track. This time, however, I was surprised at how many of them had been renovated and were now in very good shape. There were still lots of them which had not changed, but to see a significant number that had been reclaimed made me wonder if it was just speculators, or if this was the result of one of those $1 sale programs.
Yeah this is nothing new. I’ve heard about this Urban homesteading idea decades ago.
Some cities have seen gentrification and redevelopment of rundown neighborhoods.
It sounds like a great idea, that you can buy a house for $1.
But if the house is in a dangerous area, and you are required to actually live there, see how many will do this.
The city can always raise the taxes high enough so the value of the property is $1 regardless of the condition of the house.
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