Peggy Sand, Director of the Capital Area Foreclosure Network is the author of this post. Peggy wrote another blog entry for The Yardstick in November 2010 on how foreclosures exacerbate regional disparities.

Foreclosures continue to wipe out household wealth, damage credit, destabilize neighborhoods and decrease local government property tax revenues, according to new data from the Urban Institute.  Although the numbers of foreclosures are down a bit from last year, foreclosures in metro Washington are projected to be well above healthy levels through 2012.

The good news is that there are a lot programs available to help homeowners. On the other hand, the sheer number of programs (be they bank, government, or private programs) and their terms can be overwhelming, making it difficult for struggling homeowners and those trying to help them to know where to turn. To address these questions, approximately 100 nonprofit and government leaders joined the Urban Institute and the Capital Area Foreclosure Network (CAFN) on March 23 to talk about reducing the confusion and burden for homeowners facing foreclosure and to learn about the latest research on and resources for foreclosures in metro Washington. You can watch an online webcast of the event here.

All of the event’s panelists emphasized that free help is available to struggling homeowners from nonprofit housing counselors.  Mary Hunter of the Housing Initiative Partnership also noted the tremendous response that the new regional Spanish and English foreclosure hotline (888-794-8830) had received – more than 300 calls from Spanish speakers alone in its first week.  In addition, CAFN’s brochures to help the region’s struggling homeowners and renters are now available in English, Spanish, Chinese (Mandarin), Vietnamese, and Amharic.  For more information on these resources, please visit CAFN’s website.

The event also highlighted the persistence of scam artists that target at-risk homeowners throughout the region. Housing counselors said that many of their clients only come to them after paying thousands of dollars to these scammers who make promises they have no intention of keeping.  It is illegal to ask for up-front fees for foreclosure prevention help, and companies doing so should be reported.  Once several complaints have been lodged, state and federal authorities can prosecute these bad actors.

These discussions underscored the destabilizing impact of the foreclosure crisis on the region’s families and communities.  Region Forward is highly focused on promoting shared prosperity in metro Washington – one of RF’s Prosperity goals being to “minimize economic disparities and enhance the prosperity of each jurisdiction and the region as a whole through balanced growth and access to high-quality jobs for everyone.”  Combating the foreclosure crisis through education, outreach, counseling for consumers and prosecution of scam artists will be crucial to achieving greater equity and prosperity for local households and the region as a whole.

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