Fighting Foreclosure on Staten Island
Margaret Becker, Director of the Homeowner Defense Project at Staten Island Legal Services, appears in a June 22nd New York Times article that brings focus to the impact of the ongoing foreclosure crisis on Staten Island homeowners.
Staten Island is more dependent on private cars and private homes than
its urban neighbors. It has a smaller share of the very rich and very
poor than the rest of the city. While its homeownership rate is double
that of the city as a whole — some 70 percent, versus 35 percent,
according to 2006 census figures, the most recent data available — it
is roughly the same as that of the nation as a whole.
As a result, the foreclosure crisis seems to be having an impact that is proportionally larger in Staten Island than in the other boroughs. Margaret comments on the obstacles faced by an SBLS client who fell behind on his payments while waiting for his disability benefits to kick in.
“He can afford to keep the house; he’s been making payments for years,”
Ms. Becker said. “It should be easy to fix, the problem is getting
through the layers of servicing and ownership to somebody who’s able to
make the real decisions about modifying the loans.”
Click here to read the New York Times article.
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