US Taxpayers Own 248,000 Unoccupied Homes: The government does not want to damage the housing market any further, but it also doesn’t know what to do. The federal government asked the general public for ideas on how to do deal with 248,000 homes that government has taken over along with Freddie Mae and Fannie Mac. The deadline to submit proposals was in mid September of this year. What was the result? The nation is still waiting to find out. At this point, the government is still mulling over several ideas, none of which have been put into action. What is the problem? For starters, the government can’t sell many of the homes right now for a number of reasons. One reason is that there really is not much of a market right now.
Know Why US Taxpayers Own 248,000 Unoccupied Homes
Another reason is that a number of the homes just aren’t livable. In using the term livable, what it means is twofold: the homes are either not up to code and/or the homes are just not in “safe” neighborhoods. This is not to say that the neighbors are bad people, or that they are in rough neighborhoods; there are no neighbors. In certain areas, there are so many homes in neighborhoods that are vacant that once they become vacant, they are vandalized or worse. It’s not much of a neighborhood when there are no neighbors.
So what is the government going to do about it? That remains to be seen. One option the government is exploring is to create a rental partnership with private companies. Doing so will enable the homes to be kept up and eventually sold if and when the housing market returns to a level above where it has been the past few years. There are many questions to be addressed with such decisions. Will the rental or lease agreements be month to month, will those who rent the homes be forced out when the government or private company decide it is time to sell? If the government begins to go down such a road, these are just two of the many questions that need to be addressed. People have already lost their homes, once they begin to rent these homes, there needs to be something in force that can protect their interests so they do not end up without a roof over their heads.
