Regulatory Barriers Clearinghouse
Strategy-of-the-Month Club
April 2009
The current housing foreclosure crisis
is adding to the number
of vacant and abandoned properties
in many communities. Left
unattended, these properties fall prey
to vandalism, attract
crime, and contribute to overall neighborhood
decline. Not only
do local governments face increased
expenditures in the form
of maintenance and service costs for
these properties, they
also lose considerable property tax
revenue. To help local
governments minimize the effects of
property abandonment,
the United States Conference of Mayors
has compiled a report
cataloguing successful abandoned property
strategies from
across the nation. The report, Vacant
and Abandoned
Properties:
Survey and Best Practices,
contains 27 strategies
that address foreclosure prevention,
minimizing the effects of
abandoned properties, and encouraging
reuse of vacant
properties.
A number of programs described in the
report aim to curtail
blight by ensuring that abandoned properties
remain well-
maintained. For example, the city of
Chula Vista, California
adopted an abandoned property maintenance
ordinance that
requires lenders to maintain foreclosed
properties in their
inventory. Through its Vacant and Abandoned
Building
Monitoring Program, the city of Hollywood,
Florida, closely
monitors foreclosed properties for
maintenance concerns.
Other best practices in the report
include rehabilitation
programs, such as Bowling Green, Kentucky's
Rental
Conversion Program. The city's housing
authority acquires and
renovates vacant rental housing units,
which are then sold to
low-income families at affordable prices.
The city of Dallas,
Texas acquires tax-foreclosed properties
and transfers
ownership to nonprofit agencies for
affordable housing
development under its Urban Land Bank
Demonstration
Program.
For detailed descriptions of these
and other vacant and abandoned
property initiatives, please view the
report in its entirety
at https://www.huduser.gov/rbc/search/rbcdetails.asp?DocId=1877.
We hope this information proves useful
to you in your efforts to
grow your region's affordable housing
stock. If you have
regulatory reform strategies or resources
that you'd like to
share, email us at rbcsubmit@huduser.gov,
call us at 1-800-
245-2691 (option 4), or visit our website
at www.regbarriers.org.
Feel free to forward this message to
anyone who is working to
reduce regulatory barriers to affordable
housing.
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