O you know anything about NACA?
Ryan Chambers
Midwest Capital Mortgage
816-795-8500 Voice
816-407-7722 Fax
July 31, 2008
From Habitat for Humanity
f those properties and their contacts. I will be glad to continue to pass this information along to those who would like to know. Please send me an e-mail if you do not want to receive such information in the future.
Also, if you come across any property in the 3rd or 5th Council districts that you think Habitat might be interested in please do not hesitate to let me know about it. As discussed at the meeting we are primarily interested in parcels that are big enough to build at least three houses on, so preferably 150 feet of frontage on a street, and then we will look further into the neighborhood to see if there are other lots and possible rehab houses available in close proximity so that we can concentrate our building efforts and make a real impact. Just FYI, Habitat does not usually pay for lots and when we do we don’t usually offer more than $500.
If you are aware of such property in Independence please contact Truman-Heritage Habitat http://www.trumanheritagehabitat.org/ and if you know of any on the Kansas side or in North Kansas City please contact Heartland Habitat at http://www.heartlandhabitat.org/.
In addition I would like to pass along that Habitat Kansas City is now recycling aluminum cans and paper products (newspaper, office and school paper, catalogs, magazines and mail) at our office as part of our fundraising. If you would like to know more about those programs please contact me.
Thanks for your time!
Sincerely,
Craig Colbert
Development Specialist
Habitat for Humanity Kansas City
1423 E Linwood Blvd
Kansas City, Mo 64109
craig@habitatkc.org
816-924-1096 ext 104
cell 816-550-9643
July 31, 2008
Jackson County Tax Sale
Sale August 18th at the Independence Courthouse for properties east of Blue Ridge
Sale August 25th at the Kansas City Courthouse for properties west of Blue Ridge
10 days Prior to the sale you need to register as a buyer and get certified that you do not have any delinquent taxes and have a criminal record ran to show you have not had any code violations.
Then go to the sale with a bunch of cash or cashiers checks.
Each property will be cried on the courthouse steps up to 3 times until sold, if not sold by 3rd time, county get’s it and gives it to land trust
If you win the bid, you must pay for it on the spot with cash or certified funds. But you don’t get the title or actually a special warranty deed until it is processed and it could be up until April or May of the following year before you get the special warrantee deed.
Plus this is to cover the back taxes for the first 3 years, you will then owe the taxes for year 4 and 5.
And the county does not do a good job of wiping out old deeds, judgements, etc, so you may need to do a quiet title co clean up the title mess and get a marketable title.
Note the 2008 tax sale will be published in the Pulse Legal starting August 1st,
The person in the Delinquent Tax department that can explain things is Joy McQuire
Recommendation was to look for the forclosure notices in year 4 and start working the houses then before they actually go to sale in year 5.
- I requested that they could possibley publicize how the process works and as well as provide a list of houses that have not paid taxes for 2 years, for 3 years, for 4 years, etc on some county web site somewhere so that people who want to buy fixer uppers could attempt to contact the homeowners and attempt to buy while there still is a viable house there to work with.
July 31, 2008
Jackson County Land Trust Properties
http://www.jacksoncountylandtrust.org/
The Land Trust of Jackson County, Mo., is a governmental corporation established by state law to sell properties that have failed to sell on the courthouse steps to satisfy unpaid taxes. Proceeds of any sale are applied to costs of maintaining and selling the properties and to the operation of Land Trust. Properties sold by Land Trust are no longer subject to a lien for property taxes. Certain other liens may remain attached to the property title.
If you’re interested in purchasing Land Trust property, please read the purchase procedure and view the list of Land Trust properties. If you have questions, call Property and Relocation Services at (816) 513-2894.
Basically
Sumbit a letter of intent to purchase
pay for the appraisal $75 for cacant lot up to $200 on commerical property
after appraised, you pay the appraised value less the appraisal costs. If you don’t buy, you are just out your appraisal fee.
————–
Land Trust Properties are aquired through the tax sale.
If taxes are not paid in Jackson County for 3 years, then in year 4 the county will start foreclosure proceedings and publish about August and then it will go to sale in August in year 5. By that time the home has probably been vacant for 5 years and needs to be or has been torn down.
So the majority of properties are vacant lots.
Also if someone paid for an appraisal and did not buy, those properties are already priced and do not need an appraisal.
FREE lots: If there is a lot of 4,000 square feet or less, and an adjacent property owner wants to purchase, they do not need to pay for an appraisal but rather pay 50% of the county assessed value to buy. So if county assessed vaule is about $500, then you can buy lot for $250 if it is under 4000 square feet and you are an adjacent property owner.
People to talk to Claude Paige on 16th Floor of city Hall or go to the web site
July 31, 2008
Vacant Property Task Force – July 21st, 2008
Land Trust – guest Speaker Mike Hunter
- Discussed buying land trust properties – see future post
- Discussed how to buy tax sale properties – see future post
One question I have “Is there any way the county could publish the list of people who have not paid taxes for 2 years, 3 years, 4 years, etc on a web site somewhere so that people who attempt to contact people struggling with paying taxes – like the investor – could have an easily obtainable list, could mail these owners and possibly buy the properties while they are still properties before they finally go through the tax sale process and the land trust process and are so far gone that they need torn down.
Wes Schlobohm with Official Auctions talked about a place where people could donate houses for a tax dedcution besides Habitat for Humanity – to a web site www.IDonate.com
New program that Nate is trying to work out with the City is to pool property violations for a particular property – weeds, trash, other violations and take one citation to the person with so many days to correct all the problems, if not corrected the issue fines of $50 per violations. Then if nothing is still done, then take the property to receivership and using one of several current or new laws (condemnation, eminent domain, abandon housing act, etc) the city could take ownership of the property and then sell at auction to the highest bidder.
Metion of a way to track down people through www.lexisnexis.com
Dangerous Buildings is overwhelmed but trying
Discussed H.R> 3221 which sould provide between $15 million and $20 million to the Kansas City Missouri Area to deal with Foreclosure issues
- Purchase foreclosed home and rehab to stabilize – not necessarily the answer – we then have more houses for sale, creating it harder to sell houses.
- Sell these homes to sold or rented to moderate income individnauls and families – targed to low income
- any profit from sale, rental, rehab, or redevelopment must be reinvested in affordable houseing and stabilization
- and a ton of funds for pre-foreclosure counseling.
July 31, 2008
Goverment funding for vacant house
The new bill would put $10 million in funds in the hands of KCMO to deal with the vacant house problem.
Personally I hope they are able to focus that 10 million on:
1. Educating Home Buyers – we need to train first time home buyers on what it means to be a home owner, credit, and budgeting so they can keep and maintain a home once they buy it.
2. A Work for Down Payment Program – As the down payment assitance programs will no longer be able to be used for FHA and most other loans, then we could have home buyers work to earn a down payment. Volunteer to the city to do things the city can’t afford to pay for anyway and earn $100 a day; picking up and removing trash from vacant lots, parks, rivers, mowing vacant lots, cleaning up abandon houses and boarding them up. Just some ideas.
3. Partner with local banks to create special loans for a home buyer who is going to buy and live in a bank owned home: with the education piece and the work for down payment program.
4. Partner with the banks that own a lot of foreclosed homes and get them to offer special discounts and possibly new financing the the educated buyers on these programs.
Don’t spend the money on buying and fixing up houses as there are already TOO MANY HOUSES for sale right now and not enough buyers. Instead, CREATE buyers and there will be less vacant houses and less forclosures.
My opion anyway.
What do you think
July 21, 2008
more ideas
The general public could do a lot to help, but not sure how to get them involved and speaking out to the mayor, the city manager, the city council etc and demand that something be done – for example having the city sell off or give away vacant lots and city owned structures. One thing the city actually could affect and control would be to hire a few commercial realtors and a few realtors that sell fixer uppers. Maybe assign 10 structures per agent. Ask them to do a assessment as to what they think they could sell the property for – I would start with the properties that your department think could be salvaged. Most realtors offer this service for FREE – with the plan of getting the listing – offer a 7% commission with $2500 minimum (at least on residential properties) and get them listed and sold. This is what banks do, so why can the city do it. They may not make back taxes on some of the properties, but at least they are off the cities books and no longer the cities problem.
Another idea would be to hire a company like Mayo Auction or Hudson and Marshall and have the auction off the properties – maybe 30 to 50 every month until they are gone.
June 17, 2008
Are Urban Gardens the Answer
I spoke to you a while back about this junker house here by my office at 115 E Gregory. House is on Wyandotte or something just off Gregory. there is a house and a lot owned by Mercantile Bank last I checked.
Some landscaper came in last week and cleaned up the whole mess, took down the broken falling door and deck, took out the dead tree. The next day he was back with a tiller and he tilled and tilled and fertilized and tillled some more and installed a nice little garden. Now people are working in the garden on a regular basis – I don’t think anyone bought the house.
So could the city start a program for the vacant lots in the city – the city would still own, but the neighbors could take possession and put in a garden. I am sure there are some urban garden groups that could organize. And while there may not be any taxes coming in – there would be no need for mowing going on . Maybe the city could sign an agreement that if the organization cleaned up the lot and maintained it nicely as a neighborhood “urban” garden, that the city would then deed the property over to the organization.
At least it would free up some city time & money from mowing and cleaning up the larger lots. Plus it might give the neighorhood somethign to do, bring in neighborhood pride and see some care by the people in the area on their own homes.
I have read about similar things in other cities, And they always seem to be successful. Plus it would not cost the city any money really, and would probably save some money. It might bring up property values in the area, and decrease crime to some extent in the city.
Plus the gardens if they produced enough could donate to the local food banks
Some Resources
LocalHarvest – Kansas City Urban Farms Tour
|
East Wind Gardens or Root Deep Urban Farm Stand: Saturday mornings, FarmersÂ? … The Kansas City Center for Urban Agriculture is a 501(c)3 tax-exempt …
|
Discovery Center | Kansas City’s Urban Conservation Campus
| Urban Conservation Campus 4750 Troost Avenue Kansas City, Missouri 64110 … through demonstration gardens and experiential student workshops, teaches urban … mdc.mo.gov/areas/kcmetro/discovery/ – 16k – Cached – Similar pages – Note this |
The Denver Urban Gardens
| The Denver Urban Gardens web site introduces viewers to the nonprofit organization that transforms vacant, derelict inner-city lots into lush oases for the … www.dug.org/ – 2k – Cached – Similar pages – Note this |
Welcome to Urban Gardens
| All over the country communities have discovered the rewards of urban gardens. And Philadelphia’s communities have transformed more trash-strewn vacant lots … www.greentreks.org/allprograms/roughterrain/urbangardening/index.asp – 17k - |
Milwaukee Urban Gardens — Home
| Milwaukee Urban Gardens is a nonprofit land trust dedicated to acquiring and preserving land and partnering with neighborhood residents to develop and … www.milwaukeeurbangardens.org/ – 8k – Cached – Similar pages – Note this |
cab drollery: Urban Gardens
| Urban Gardens. Just about the time my inner curmudgeon threatens to take over permanently, I hear about some human endeavor which is so ingenious that I … cabdrollery.blogspot.com/2008/06/urban-gardens.html – 17k - |
June 5, 2008
Marketing of Vacant Lots
Financing – the loan that Charlie has is great, but anyone that uses that loan needs a way to get out of the loan, that means they have to sell or refinance out. And our good friends at Flat Irons had that problem. They lent for the rehab but the borrowers could not sell and they could not refi out – now Flat Irons owns a bunch of houses that they can do much with in the urban core.
I have posted a list of lenders that offer similar loans to the one Charlie has on my fixkc blog – http://fixkcmo.wordpress.com
We have found two lenders that offer refinance out of the loan that do not have any seasoning -
Bank of Blue Valley (Joanne Yoder 913-451-4171 – will finance out of state, up to 80% cash out with no seasoningand
Bank of Kansas City (Willie Keely 816-347-7012 – will not finance out of state borrowers, min 680 score 80% cash out, 90% no cash out, no seasoning, only 1 stated, rest must be full doc)
KCB bANK (816-903-6136 – rehab loans and permanent, 20% down, 1 point, 620 score, will finance out of state buyers)
Pilaski Bank (Jenny Ziler 913-709-8761 – 80% cash out , need 90 days seasoning, will finance out of state.
————————————————————————————–
So if we can find investor buyers who could partner with a non-profit to gain ownership and using their own cash or the rehab loan to rehab in partnership with the non-profit (this might be problimatic if no certificate of occupancy and not a clear cut definition of who owns the proeprty), then they could refi out with one of the above lenders, pleace a rental or a rent to own tenant and pull cash flow.
————————————————————————————-
Marketing of properties – get some kind of campaign out to the Realtors of the area and let them know about the vacant property database, and find a way that a realtor could look up their listing and post how to get in touch with them to make an offer on the property. Would also give you a way to find out who might be taking care of about 20 to 30% of the properties on the list – and we need to promote the list – I am going through an online marketing training program that someone could utilize to promote the web site – might want to purchase a direct .com name for it and then promote it through all the search engines.
—————————————————————————————–
Spend some time talking to the Land Bank group in KCK – when I had all of you speak at MAREI a few years ago along with the people from KCK, they sent in a realtor to talk not about how their land bank works, but show what larger structures the city had for sale, what they envisioned being done with the property and their plans for the area. So someone – not on our task force could be brought in to assess the commercial structures and then look at city overall growth plans for the area, then take the vacant structures the city owns that I am sure Nate has to deal with for trash, board ups, and mowing, get them marketed and sold to a developer. Then the city makes a sale, gets a large property off the books and as the developer does something with the larger structures, the single family around the area will become more attractive to home buyers and might take care of a portion of the problem all by itself. KCMO needs to do the same as KCK . Of course attracting new start up business is hard with the 1% tax and the lack of direction in KCMO
———————————————————————————————————————
Vacant Lots – beg neighboers to take them, forgive any back taxes and levies, get these lots off the city books. If there is a large patch of lots together – GIVE them to a builder who could build single family, duplexes, row houses or something. For example on a block like 69th and Bellefontaine, There are a bunch of land trust lots and vacant houses, Give the lots to the developer, possibly subsidize in some way the acquisition of the vacant houses – find a way to tear down the unsalvagable ones and renovate the good ones – we own on that block, and have a house that needs torn down, but the lender on the property would have a fit if we took it down, the lender needs to be paid off first and we don’t have the funds, but if there were a way that on a block like this a large entiy in charge could get the funding for a large, whole block development, it could set aside funds to pay off lenders in the process, and create a nice viable street for people to live on and get rid of the vacant over grown lots and the eysore houses. Our house on this block is just one of about 14 houses that are in really rough shape.
May 29, 2008
$50,000,000 in development funding
I got this flyer in the mail today
New Markets TAx Credits
Thursday June 26, 2008
Central Bank of KC and KCMO have formed a unique partnership to provide $50 million of NMTC for investment in Kansas Cities underserved communities.
