Posted on 01/27/2008 5:03:23 PM PST by traumer
The streets are empty. Trash rustles down the road past rusted barbecues, abandoned furniture, sagging homes and gardens turned to weed.
This is Shaker Heights, a suburb of Cleveland and a town ravaged by the subprime mortgage crisis roiling the United States.
Faded "for sale" signs sit in front of deserted houses. The residents are gone, either in search of new jobs after the factories shut down, or in shame after being evicted for missing their mortgage payments.
A red, white and blue American flag flies over windows and doors which have been boarded up to keep the drug dealers away.
Thieves have stripped many homes of the plumbing, the doors, the windows, the aluminum siding.
The police station parking lot is full. The officers, who have seen their numbers triple since 2006, are coming back from their rounds. They speak of installing alarms in some of the homes claimed by squatters.
At 9422 Chagrin Street, a hand-scrawled sign attached to a window indicates someone lives there: "Please Used."
After three rings of the bell, Sarah Evans, 60, opens the door with a mixture of curiosity and alarm.
She says she is one of the last people left on the street. And she is on the verge of losing this two-bedroom house in which she has lived for more than 30 years because she simply cannot afford her monthly payments.
It is a complicated story. She refinanced in 2003, but did not realize the document she signed included provisions to radically increase the interest rate.
She stopped making payments in 2006 and shows her unpaid bills totaling 24,000 dollars.
Her bank is in the midst of eviction procedures.
"When folks buy a home they expect to die in it, I guess," she said as she stood outside in the cold. "I had my American Dream but it became a nightmare."
Her words are echoed by the angry barks of the guard dogs pacing behind a chain link fence two houses away that was installed by the new owner: a bank.
The massive parking lot of the Eagle Fresh supermarket is empty.
Behind her till, Myra Bibldwit lifts her head when a bell signals the entrance of a customer.
"Not many folks come anymore. We're used to it," said the 24-year-old cashier, one of the few in the neighborhood who managed to hold onto her job.
In the five hours since she started working today she has served just 10 customers. "Maybe you will buy something," she says with a smile.
Then comes customer number 12.
Laura Johnston, 50, says that her street -- about 10 minutes away by car -- was alive two years ago. Today, half the houses are abandoned.
"Folks could not afford their payments. They were asked to pay loans which doubled. They could not afford it, some lost their job. Lenders were greedy. They threw them out of their homes," she told AFP.
"I'm very upset. I missed my friend Helen. She disappeared overnight. She did not even say goodbye."
There are plenty of cases like Helen. They are called the neighbors who disappear in the night.
For county treasurer Jim Rokakis, the greed of the banks is to blame for this man-made disaster.
"All you needed was a pulse to buy a house. Some loans were written with no money down, no proof of buyer's incomes. They did not even check what people were saying. Most of those folks were jobless," he said in an interview.
"Shaker Heights was the perfect storm: poor folks, unemployed and a desire to get a piece of the American Dream."
Who can't afford that?
Was it a fair trade? I’ve been to Shaker Heights but have never been to East St Louis. ;)
Oh good grief.
Are we led to believe that an entire town took on loans they couldn’t afford?
Th truth is that the town has been in decline for decades, as has most of the Cleveland area.
What’s next? A picture essay on how the “mortgage crisis” has destroyed Detroit?
I think we s****** them royally.
Absolutely!! Just never go there to find out why.
Sounds like she stopped making payments not only on her mortgage but also her electricity, her water, her swerage, her phone, her credit cards, and every other bill that was coming in........
30 years living in the same house and she re-mortgages? Wonder what she did with the cash............
There certainly is a heck of a lot more to this story than is being reported.......
maybe this ought to be posted under fiction.
I want at least one more bathroom.
And I understand their property taxes are astronomical. Shaker Heights is where John Ogbu did the cross-racial education analysis that showed that black students didn't achieve at the same level as white students because of cultural formation.
Actually, ghost towns are tourist attractions (just ask anyone in Arizona or New Mexico). But then, if they were brain-dead enough to borrow beyond their means, they’re probably too stupid to recognize an economic opportunity.
“All you needed was a pulse to buy a house. Some loans were written with no money down, no proof of buyer’s incomes. They did not even check what people were saying. Most of those folks were jobless,” he said in an interview.
We know that you have never been to East Saint Louis. Had you been there, you would be typing from the Great Beyond.
Sounds like she fell for a line by a real scum bag.
Sounds like a great deal. You buy a house for no down, live in it, don’t pay and get to walk away.
She’s also been living rent-free for at least 13 months.
Google maps shows that the address 9422 Chagrin Street, Shaker Heights, Ohio directly neighbors two golf courses and the Shaker Heights Country Club.
I just love trying to blame the banks for taking all their money to overpay for houses then defaulting to them and running the whole thing into the ground. Of course they were supposed to just give the whole neighborhood to the newcomers gratis, along with some fat checks.
Cry me a river...
Next time BUY what you can afford!
When you’re positon runs out - join the rest of us and find another one!
Few have a job for life!
Get used to it!
According to the article the lady had been in that house for almost 30 years.........sounds to me like she re-mortgaged for the cash then blew the cash........
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