Sunday, March 09, 2008

Star Confuses Indianapolis With Detroit

Some blog commenters are fond of saying Indianapolis is becoming South Detroit because of the city's rising taxes and crime problem. An Indianapolis Star story today on the city's growing abandoned house problem literally confuses the city with Detroit. Ted Evanoff's story, describing efforts by the Indianapolis Housing Agency to buy up abandoned houses repossessed by HUD, reports, in part:

More than 7,000 abandoned buildings in the city can be traced in part to a massive rate of foreclosure brought on by personal bankruptcies, job losses and illicit real estate schemes. The schemes were enabled when mortgage lenders throughout the nation funneled cash to shady investors under the easy loan standards that were common earlier in the decade, real estate experts say.

In September, one of every 109 houses in the Indianapolis metropolitan area was in the process of foreclosure, ranking the area 24th in the nation in foreclosures. Two years earlier, the area ranked first.

Alarmed by the rapid pace of foreclosures, the U.S. attorney's office in Indianapolis convened a law enforcement task force aimed at stamping out real estate fraud in the metro area. Since 2002, prosecutors have convicted 59 individuals for defrauding lenders of more than $40 million.

Donna Eide, a retired assistant U.S. attorney who prosecuted most of the cases, has said more than 2,000 real estate fraud cases came to her attention. She said the 59 were selected for prosecution because they were among the largest frauds or easiest to investigate.

The housing agency, which manages a federal rent subsidy program for 27,000 city residents, is pursuing the plan with HUD because the heavy foreclosure rate has taken hundreds of houses off the market that could have been rented out. That's created a shortage of affordable rentals for poor families in the three zip codes, Myers said.

HUD takes possession of foreclosed property that had been purchased by private buyers using loans guaranteed by the U.S. government. In zip codes 48201, 48203 and 48218, home to about 100,000 people, HUD takes over about 80 houses a month.

The zip codes 48201, 48203 and 48218 referenced in this last sentence from the story are all located in Detroit. Hat tip to the observant Advance Indiana reader for passing this glaring error on to me.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

I guess that answers a question I have had in my mind for a few years. A double rental home in poor condition was sold full price. Whoever bought it was never seen,no one tried to rent it or repair it, the house sat and sat until the following year the foreclosure sign went up. Reading the info on window it was an out of state bank and the owners name I tried to look up but was unsuccessful. Whenever I had purchased a home they checked everything -where every dime came from-beyond necessary. Yet this freeforall went on and now the taxpayers will pay and the economy is in the tank because of it. Prosecute them all.

Anonymous said...

Bart Peterson sent Indianapolis into a downward spiral that I'm not sure we will ever recover from. Yes, Bart created South Detroit, Indiana.

http://whoisakindele.info/2007/10/indianapolis-101-conservatives-must.html

Remember Bart gave millionaires millions, a new football field, basketball arena for thugs constantly associated with criminal activity, failed to hire police for two years, did not replace aging capital equipment (ie: snow plows, salt trucks, police cars)...and he let crime increase so much that terrified people began an exodus of Indianapolis.

Can Indianapolis survive the TAX AND SPEND corruption of The Democrat Machine? -I'm just not sure.

Anonymous said...

You are so right about Bart Peterson and his "idiot" staff especially John "the drunk" Dillon! The problem is that Greg Ballard has sold out to the same Bart Peterson politicans! So six of one, half dozen of the other! Crooks are still crooks!
Had enough of Greg Ballard?

Anonymous said...

I just find it hard to believe that
reporter Ted Evanoff, who wrote this for the Star would make that kind of a mistake. Granted, there is only one key between the 6 and 8buttons on his keyboard but damn, he should know what the hell the zip is where he works.
My feeling is that Ted knew those were Detroit zips when he wrote the article.
Even though I have many abandoned houses around me that the city refuses to help us with I still find this screwup funny as hell.
BTW, Detroit's now down to only just over 10,000 abandoned houses and the last estitmate from a person on the Mayor's staff put Indy's abandoned houses at 12,382.
Less than 4% of these are HUD homes so this deal with HUD is just a drop in the ocean.
I'd say we have a rather serious problem here. But the Mile Square area looks nice for visitor doesn't it. God help the tourists that wander out of that area.

Anonymous said...

I'm not so sure this is a "Bart problem" as opposed to a lender problem. Last time I checked he wasn't responsible for giving out the loans or creating the schemes. The true culprits are the people that prey on the unwitting wanna-be-investor that simply doesn't know any better.

Anonymous said...

Gary, I read five or six blogs every day. Whenever the Detroit-Indy connection is mentioned, out come the crazies.

Hyperbole is fine in literature, people, but please. Detroit?

Look at the stats and the facts. Not even close.

(And can the Peterson blame game somehow get back to reality, and facts?)

Anonymous said...

OT but I knew you could answer it. Did Carson indeed send out a mailer with the pic of a burden out humvee on it?

I will refrain from commenting until I know. Thank you.

Anonymous said...

I always wonder if the people who compare Indianapolis to Detroit actually live and work in the same Center Township as I do?

Anonymous said...

Darn Dyslexia
burden above should be "burned"

Sorry.

Anonymous said...

8:13 Center Township is the reason we are now living in South Detroit, Indiana!!!

Please read the following link, which describes why Center Twp is worse than Detroit:

http://whoisakindele.info/2007/10/indianapolis-101-conservatives-must.html



P. S. Bart sent us into a downward spiral. We may never recover from it. While the rich got richer, including his expanded executive staff, the basic functions of city government were left stagnate and without the tools to do the job. The failure to continue ongoing capital purchases has the city in crisis. We can't just buy a fleet of snow plows, salt trucks, paving machines, police cars in one big swoop. Bart stopped the capital purchases, now we're in crisis.

Anonymous said...

So 10:15, I take that response as a "no", if you have to read a blog to replace firsthand observation.

Anonymous said...

I really think that's a typo...it's not unusual for the Star to mix up its geography, they recently called 2000 S Shelby "east side".

Cheapest single family home in 48201 is $229,900:

http://www.realtor.com/search/searchresults.aspx?zp=48201&typ=1

46201, 46203, and 46218 are REo central in Indy.

Anonymous said...

Has anyone seen the MONSTROUS chuck holes along west 38th street!
Nothing turns a city into a ghetto faster than chuckholes.

There are literally hundreds right along the "seams" of the road, every 25-50 feet. It's as if the contractors did not use on rebar to reinforce underneath or skimped out on the concrete, and the sides of the seams are just caving in.

We need to sue all those contractors or make the do the job over--else they get no more contracts.

It's really bad!

This administration needs to forego giving out lobbying contracts and get legal working on fixing our crooked vendor problems.

Perhaps, sweatpea's company was responsible.