Contractors must be on an approved list. (Bribe time)
Each stage of work gets inspected for partial and final payment. This is coordinated along with the regional utility companies.
Most the homes have received zero maintenance for the past 30 years and are uninsurable. Rotted floors, broken sewer lines from house to curb, out of code wiring and plumbing, termite damaged, and just pure neglect.
Enter the assistance program.....What good are new windows when there is no wood left to nail into? Hooking up a new heat pump / A/C system that sanitary drains the condensate(law) into a sanitary drain line into a broken line in the yard? The house eventually floods and the yard is a mud pit.
What good is a new hot water heater if you have your water turned off for non-payment?
And so on........you get the picture.
Not to mention they usually can't even find the Auntee or grandmother that actually owns the house. The occupants are really just related squatters.
Mafia style payouts it sounds like.
Of course, no fines for the owners of these degraded buildings. Let’s just fix them off backs of taxpayers while the owners continue to get their rent money.
Of course, no fines for the owners of these degraded buildings. Let’s just fix them off backs of taxpayers while the owners continue to get their rent money.
“Not to mention they usually can’t even find the Auntee or grandmother that actually owns the house. The occupants are really just related squatters.”
That was a big problem after Hurricane Harvey. It took some time for actual ownership to be established, big problem when no one has kept up with the “title” since grandma died, people occupying house would have say a 1/6 ownership, the rest would belong to siblings, cousins, etc. It is just not good enough to say that “Grandma always said the house was mine”.
I have a customer who was bidding the replacement of federal housing on one of the Indian reservations out west. The original buildings were 30 years old but needed to be torn down to the concrete foundation and start over again because of the neglect. There was nothing left in the structure. Not even in the frame that was salvageable.
He said we are lucky IF the concrete foundation is salvageable.