Support Neighborhood Stabilization Funding

Thirty-three national housing and community development organizations have come together to ask Congress to support Neighborhood Stabilization Funding.  Please send a letter to your Senators or Members of Congress, asking them to support Neighborhood Stabilization Funding.

The $4 billion emergency funding would be used to facilitate the bulk purchase and rehabilitation of foreclosed homes in targeted areas. In turn, this would help stabilize communities, create rental and ownership opportunities for low- and moderate-income families and stop the cycle of disinvestment.

These critically needed funds will help foreclosure-impacted communities across the country gain desperately needed economic stability after the devastation caused by concentrated foreclosures.

Toll-free number: 888-460-0813 (connects to Capitol switchboard; ask to speak to your Senators’ and Representative’s office.)

Tell your Senators and Representative:

• Congress should provide at least $4 billion in emergency grants for the purchase and rehabilitation of foreclosed homes. This will help impacted communities across the country gain desperately needed economic stability after the devastation caused by concentrated foreclosures.
• Foreclosures are rampant, up 75 percent nationally from 2006 levels. And the number of lender-owned (REO) homes nearly doubled in the fourth quarter of 2007 from the same period the year before.
• Homes stand vacant in communities with large numbers of foreclosures, creating crime and arson hazards, draining local tax bases and dragging down neighbors’ home prices. Everyone loses — the lender, the homeowner, the renter and the neighborhood, especially the families who played by the rules, bought homes they could afford and paid their mortgages on time, but whose neighbors have lost their homes to foreclosure.
• The Joint Economic Committee estimates that more than $736 billion in housing wealth has already been lost. It predicts that more than $1.14 trillion will be lost by the end of 2008 and another $748 billion in 2009.
• This crucial $4 billion investment of federal resources is estimated to:
  
  • Generate at least $10 billion in economic activity nationwide
  • Create more than 32,000 jobs
  • Generate more than $800 million in one-time revenue for all levels of government
  • Restore nearly $60 million per year in real estate tax collections by local governments
  
  
• Critics have called this funding a bailout of lenders and borrowers. We strongly disagree.
  
  • No one wins from foreclosures. After a foreclosure, both the former homeowner and the lender incur significant losses, often as much as 50 cents on the dollar.
  • Under both House- and Senate-passed bills, Congress would require that funds only be used to purchase discounted properties at below current market appraised values. And funds would be targeted to the hardest-hit communities.