By Tom Davidson
MERCER COUNTY — It took a while, but the country’s financial situation has caught up — or fallen down — to what’s been happening here for a long time.
Long before Lehman Brothers’ bankruptcy and Countrywide Financial’s subprime lending failures sent Wall Street into a free fall that helped secure a $700 billion federal bailout, local stalwarts that made our Main Streets bustle — companies like Sharon Steel, Westinghouse and CBI — were rusted and relegated to golden memories.
The home foreclosure crisis didn’t rate a blip on the national radar until California “McMansions” bought with subprime mortgages that sounded too good to be true busted when interest rates spiked.
Here, financial crises and foreclosures are old news.
“It’s bad,” Shenango Valley Urban League Housing Director Mark A. Thompson said. “We’ve been in crisis mode since 2000.
“The problem’s been real in this area for a number of years, but it’s just finally gotten national,” Thompson said.
The good news is help is out there. The bad news is the help isn’t available in cold, hard cash.
County foreclosures have ballooned in the last decade: Sheriff’s sales — the final step of the foreclosure process — numbered 33 in 1995, while in 2007 there were 399 cases logged at the county prothonotary’s office, Thompson said.
And that’s only counting people who’ve lost their homes, not those who are still struggling to keep them, he said.
“A lot of people are in foreclosure because their monthly household income has drastically changed or they’ve gotten themselves into financial jeopardy,” Thompson said.
It crosses across “all racial and ethnic lines” and is a problem in each Mercer County community, he said.
“It cuts across all financial levels and education levels: administrators, laborers, financial professionals, lottery winners,” Thompson said. “They’re all a part of this.”
If you think you’re in trouble, it’s time to look for help, he advises, but cautions against paying for the help or listening to bad advice.
People are “being told to walk away from the mortgage and they’re also falling prey to bogus foreclosure solution organizations” that cost money that could be applied to the debt.
“All the resolutions to foreclosures already exist to every homeowner … and they’re free,” Thompson said.
The Urban League and Community Action Partnership of Mercer County are two of the places to get sound advice, he said.
The Urban League is the point agency authorized by the state to take Homeowner’s Emergency Mortgage Assistance Program applications — a state program that provides loans to bring mortgages current and keep people away from foreclosure, Thompson said.
“It buys time for the homeowner to correct and address their financial situation,” he said. “It also stops them from immediately incurring attorney fees.”
The Urban League and Mercer County Community Action Partnership both provide free counseling for financially-troubled folks “to come up with a plan or budget to correct the situation themselves,” Thompson said.
This counseling is the only part of the local programs to be federally-subsidized with cash, he said.
This counseling can help, “but it doesn’t pay a mortgage,” he said.
“It’s not the perfect fix to the situation,” Thompson said.
About 90 people can be assisted locally each year through emergency mortgage assistance loans and another 60 to 80 are helped by the counseling, he said.
“The balance of the people” — the ones whose foreclosed homes end up at sheriff’s sales — “they’re being told to walk away from the mortgage and the situation” even though they might be eligible for help, Thompson said.
“You can contact our agency and Community Action Partnership,” to find out if your problems can be solved.
“People need to know there are options available,” he said. “Initial contact should be made when financial stress and inability to make a mortgage payment is knocking at your door.”
It’s a slow and arduous process, Thompson warns, “it’s going to take time, patience and sticking to a financial plan to resolve the situation.”
“(This) may mean giving up something else so you can meet your budget,” he said. “The more you put it off, the worse it gets.”
For more information about foreclosure assistance, call the Shenango Valley Urban League at 724-981-5310 or Community Action Partnership of Mercer County at 724-342-6222 or online at www.svul.org or www.capmercer.org.
