The Skillman Foundation, a local philanthropic agency, is warning that the planned foreclosure of 62,000 properties by Wayne County that is coming in a few days could create instability resulting from mass evictions disrupting the lives of tens of thousand of Detroiters and children in particular.

Compare that to 89,000 total tax foreclosures in the decade between 2003 and 2013, Skillman Foundation’s Chris Uhl said, quoting from a Detroit Blight Removal Task Force report—and the size of the wave becomes clearer. “Over 90 percent of those properties turned into blighted structures that we now have to take down,” he said.

And that’s of special concern to Skillman — which has invested $80 million over the past eight years in six Detroit neighborhoods slated to see 14,000 of the foreclosures in the coming year.
In my opinion the optics of this mass foreclosure and resulting evictions will be ugly. I can hear, "First they shut off our water, now we are being thrown out in the winter." Maybe add "just before Christmas" to make the poignancy complete.

Of special concern, Uhl said, is the fact that 37,000 of the properties are occupied, according to data collected through the MotorCity Mapping database developed by Loveland Technologies and Data Driven Detroit...

...We know that’s an issue,” Uhl said. “A lot of times in Detroit, you have a tenant who pays... It’s the landlord who doesn’t pay the city taxes, and unfortunately the consequences fall on the tenant.”

Those owners could come back around and re-buy the house or another one and repeat the process, another issue being looked at, Uhl said.
My guess is that due to the immensity of the action with existing staffing the enforcement of the foreclosures and evictions will have to play out over a long time. More of a drip-drip-drip rather than a bucket water on the head.

What do you think? More trouble than the water shut-off or will the dispossessed meekly fade away?

Read Full article on Crain's Detroit Business