Taxpayers pay millions to mow lawns of foreclosed homes

[X Factor 1,112]

Taxpayers pay millions to mow lawns of foreclosed homes

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/power-players-abc-news/taxpayers-pay-millions-mow-lawns-foreclosed-homes-100514058.html

Spinners and Winners

American taxpayers own close to 200,000 vacant houses, and over the next year they will spend more than $40 million just to mow lawns at these properties. Taxpayers also foot the bills to paint walls, fix cabinets, plant flowers and more -- expenses that just last year, exceeded a half a billion dollars.

The housing bailout has already cost taxpayers $124 million, now Americans are spending hundreds of millions more fixing up foreclosed homes to try and sell them. It is a bizarre and expensive side effect of the housing market collapse and failure of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the mortgage giants that went into federal conservatorship in 2008.

[Related: Americans brace for next wave of foreclosures]

Fannie Mae alone repaired nearly 90,000 homes last year.

"That is a lot of homes, and it is a lot of materials that need to be purchased," said Jay Ryan, Fannie Mae's vice president of real estate owned homes.

Ultimately, Ryan said, Fannie Mae pays electricity bills, property taxes, and the costs of general upkeep of properties to make sure houses are ready to sell. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have already sold hundreds of thousands of homes, but they continue to foreclose on thousands more every month. Real estate experts say getting rid of all of them is not going to happen any time soon.

"We've got to get the government out of the housing market, the mortgage market," said Guy Cecala, CEO and publisher of Inside Mortgage Finance Publications. "That's very difficult to do when the housing market is on its knees.

[Related: End of the foreclosure mess?]

Fannie Mae says fixing the houses and maintaining them will ultimately save taxpayers money, because they will yield higher prices in the marketplace. But in the meantime, we've got a lot of yard work to do.

..

[Leatherneck 693]

Another one of the many areas and businesses the feds have no business being involved in.

Only a foolish, clown bureaucrat would udder such nonsense - never dawning on the government they shouldn't be in the housing market, period.

[X Factor 1,112]

Wouldn't it make better sense to auction off these property so as to remove the burden from the taxpayers?

[Jamie and Sveta 18]

Wouldn't it make better sense to auction off these property so as to remove the burden from the taxpayers?

I agree fully. Put the homes on the market (even at 2% above payoff) and let others buy them.

[Darnell 8,478]

alas, many of these landscaping companies employ illegal aliens, as well.

so, tax dollars used for funding an illegal alien's presence in the USA. crikey.

Since it's the Feds, maybe (just maybe) they can force the contractors to have ALL go through E-Verify prior to the first payroll ..

[Leatherneck 693]

Wouldn't it make better sense to auction off these property so as to remove the burden from the taxpayers?

Sure that makes sense. The problem with you is, you're thinking, you're being logical - Stop it!

Bureaucrats and the pencil-neck paper pushers that clog the halls of gubment, just don't rationalize

and reason the way the rest of us do.