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The most important American stock exchange: your neighborhood housing stock

Last night, around 6o South Park [1] neighbors got together at Hope Lutheran Church for our annual “Hot Toddy” party [2]– food, desserts, alcohol, kids, a raffle for some amazing gift baskets and South Park Family Feud game- where the survey said: we’ve built a pretty special neighborhood. South Park is reportedly one of only a few Dayton neighborhoods where the property values went up in the last appraisal.

Sure we have some vacant homes that could be torn down as nuisance structures and we’ve also got some homes occupied by nuisance people, but the real difference (besides the recent crime spree which can be directly related to the aforementioned nuisance people) is that we truly have built our social capital by relentlessly working on quality of life issues, so that the tagline “where neighbors become friends” actually means something. The “social network” of our neighborhood is more real than virtual and the value is very tangible.

Last year I met a nice couple who were starting a business [3] through my Veterans Owning Businesses group- VOB108.org [4] When they visited my office, a building I bought in 1988 for $2,200 plus taking over $2,400 in back taxes, they fell in love with what I had done with the old corner grocery. I informed them of another old storefront that was available down the street. They now own 4 buildings in South Park, are residents and even have his parents investing in some other homes in the neighborhood. These values aren’t like stock prices at the Wall Street Casino and these investments aren’t short-term bets, because real housing markets have real transactional costs and real values attached to them.

Earlier this week, the Dayton Daily News reported that the Feds weren’t too happy with our demolition-happy policy pushed by Commissioner Nan Whaley (who accepted huge donations from “unknown demolition contractors” [5])

The city of Dayton, already losing ground in its war on urban decay, is slashing its housing inspection department after the federal government said it spent millions in taxpayer dollars with “no reportable accomplishments.”

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development said the amount of seriously dilapidated housing exploded between 2005 and 2009 in all four neighborhoods it studied.

It questioned the city’s long-standing policy of funding its housing inspections with HUD Community Development Block Grant money, and called on city officials to re-evaluate how it is spending the federal money.

via Feds criticize city’s proposal to trim housing inspection program [6].

Had the millions been spent improving quality of life (CDBG money has been used in South Park for park improvements, street closings, new lighting, wrought iron fences for public spaces etc) perhaps the value of the investment of our tax dollars actually brought a return. You don’t build value by tearing down, you just subtract negative value. There is no incentive for new investment, no growth. Empty lots are very rarely tangible assets in a country going through a disastrous slide in real housing values thanks to the non-existent Federal oversight on the FIRE industries (Financial, Insurance & Real Estate) with their play money secondary markets and the trillions of dollars stolen from the working-class people of this great country.

From today’s Dayton Daily News we find that Ohio is particularly hard hit by the double whammy of higher vacancy rates and lower tax revenues:

Ohio’s housing vacancy rate jumped 50 percent between 2000 and 2010, the 10th largest leap among the states and far above the U.S. average of 33 percent, the Government Accountability Office said last week.

The increases in vacancies are costly to taxpayers, the GAO noted, straining community services like police and fire protection and sometimes requiring taxpayer-funded maintenance and demolition. The impact of vacant homes on surrounding property values also may reduce communities’ tax revenues.

Across the nation, the number of vacant housing units, excluding units for seasonal migrant workers, climbed from 6.8 million in 2000 to 10.3 million in 2010, a change of 51.2 percent.

Ohio’s vacancy rate — the amount of vacant property as a percentage of total housing stock — rose 49.8 percent from 2000 to 2010, going from 6.1 percent to 9.1 percent, the GAO said. That’s the 10th highest, but better than the top three: New Hampshire (77.4 percent), Minnesota, (75.8 percent) and Michigan (73 percent).

Ohio ranked in the top 20 states in three other indicators related to vacancies: the 2000-2010 percentage change in the number of vacant residential properties (13th), the unemployment rate (18th) and the percentage of loans in foreclosure (eighth) as of December 2010, according to the GAO report, issued Tuesday.

via Ohio’s housing vacancy rate up 50 percent in past decade [7].

The focus on the wrong “Stock Markets” by the media and the politicians has allowed the greatest crime in history to be carried off which has filled the pockets of the super rich while draining those of the rest of us. This is the transfer of wealth and the huge income gap that brought the Occupy Wall Street movement to the forefront. The giant sucking sound will continue as community after community goes bankrupt- all while the fat cats on Wall Street continue on their merry way playing with your money on their play market. Had we bailed out the homeowners instead of the robber barons by:

There are some other issues of fairness that need to be addressed in the United States if we want to build a relatively fair and level economic playing field including:

The real stock value in America has never been on Wall Street but on Main Street. It’s time we aligned our Federal policy with good sound financial policy. Only then, will we be building value in our country instead of allowing the few to profit from the collective labors of us all.

On Tuesday, December 13, 2011, I’ll find out if I’m on the ballot to run for Congress in OH-10. If you like what you read in this post, please consider visiting www.electesrati.com [8] and signing up to volunteer or donate to a campaign that will be funded by the people who built this great country- not the ones who are trying to steal it.

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Abner

Good post David.

Joe

I live in south park and really enjoy it, but property crime is a huge downfall of this neighborhood. Ive had my car broken into at least 4 times in the past month. Stereo was stolen first time because I left it unlocked – mea culpa. It was several years old, and I was somewhat surprised when it got taken. Next time, they pried the lock out of my door with a crowbar and damaged the door itself – to steal absolutely NOTHING. I have never kept anything of value in the car, besides the stereo that might get them $10. Now that it is unlocked (as well as unlockable…) I find my car dug through about once a week. I also have to go to a body shop to get the door repaired.

I rent an apartment, and I know i could mortgage a small house for what I pay. I am quite yet in a position to buy in SP or Dayron, or now do I really have any desire to. Someday I would like to purchase/mortgage/own my own property.  Once my lease is up I’m going to ask for a reduction in rent mostly because of these problems. I am willing to bet I could finger the neighbors or characters in SPark that are the ones stealing and ruining the district. Several of my friends in SP have reported break-ins to their cars in the past month. A friend on Johnson found a bookbag full of textbooks in his garbage cans, and tracked down the owner on Clover – the books owner’s car was broken into. There is also very very little police can do to track this down, nor would they have the time to do this. A presence (a cruiser, a motorcycle or bike cop, etc…) in the neighboorhood after hours would go a LONG way though. My old place in Walnut Hills was much “safer”, though SPark is regarded as the “nicer” place to live.

Anyone else have break ins lately? David, I know you’ve struggled with this. What’s to be done about it?

Teri Lussier

From Cleveland.com: Homesteading plan to put refugees in vacant homes.

Many refugees arrive as two-parent families, often after languishing for years in refugee camps. They’re anxious to start new lives and that starts with a place to live.
“We have all these empty houses. These people need homes,” said Karin Wishner, executive director of the International Services Center, the region’s oldest resettlement agency. “This seems to be a good answer to both problems.”
Her agency typically helps find modest rental housing for the newcomers, who receive a small government stipend to get started in America. Refugees may arrive suddenly, however, and that housing hunt can be a scramble. Landlords are often reluctant to accept tenants with no credit or work history.
Wishner said she has long dreamt of a reliable supply of decent, vacant housing.
That was intriguing news to Gus Frangos, president of what’s formally called the Cuyahoga County Land Reutilization Corp. He has more vacant houses than he knows what to do with. The usual solution, demolition, costs his agency $10,000 to $20,000 per house.
When Wishner told him she knew of hard-working families who would love to go to work on a neglected house and join the neighborhood, Frangos went and met some of them, couples from Africa, Asia and South America.
“They’re all very earnest,” Frangos said. “They want to work. And they want to live here. I’m like, ‘Heck, that’s what we need in our community. People!’ ”

 
There’s a lot more. I know you’ve been thinking along these lines for years, David. Watch out- the city of Dayton just might catch up to you. ;-)

Neighborhoods have to develop social capital. That’s really the only thing that ever created neighborhoods in the first place. Dynamic neighborhoods are not about the homes, never have been, rather they are about the people who live in those homes.

Steve

Off subject.  Crown Partners will be the next Qbase. And we just gave them 100,000 cash. You heard it here first.

J Dziwulski

David, great post (yours too, Terri)