Everyone can agree with the saying that if you do the crime, be prepared to do the time. The reality of it, however, is not everyone who enters the criminal justice system should or will serve time in jail. Jail… Read more ›
As the buzz about the Cuyahoga Land Bank’s successes grows, more news outlets across the state are approaching the staff for insights on solving their own housing crises. In recent months, reporters and talk show hosts from Cincinnati, Dayton and… Read more ›
Lake County appears to be moving closer to establishing a county land bank to help deal with foreclosed and abandoned properties. Land banks have a mission to accumulate these properties by various and versatile methods. The property can be held… Read more ›
CLEVELAND, Ohio — An emerging movement in Cleveland sees an alternative to knocking down the region’s thousands of vacant homes. The process is known as “deconstruction,” and it differs from demolition because up to 40 percent of a building’s remains… Read more ›
CLEVELAND – The Cuyahoga Land Bank is celebrating two milestones this week. On Thursday the group announced they have acquired their 1,500th property and have also demolished their 750th property. The land bank, formed in 2009, was created with the… Read more ›
Television audiences and land planners on three continents are learning about the Cuyahoga Land Bank. Crews from France, Germany, Japan and Canada came to Cleveland in the past year to witness the Cuyahoga Land Bank’s winning strategies firsthand, and an… Read more ›
PARMA, Ohio – The good news is, the foreclosure rate dropped in Cuyahoga county by more than 10 percent in 2011. The bad news is, new foreclosures are still coming in at a rate of more than 900 a month.… Read more ›
The foreclosure epidemic — coming after years of depopulation and disinvestment — has left Cleveland and cities large and small throughout Northeast Ohio saddled with tens of thousands of community-destroying abandoned properties. Those vacant structures not only depress the value… Read more ›
A long-awaited plan to develop 90 acres along Cleveland’s lakefront is moving forward. Cleveland City Council Monday night approved Mayor Frank Jackson’s 25-year development plan, which spans the shoreline from the Port of Cleveland to Burke Lakefront Airport. The blueprint,… Read more ›
Lake County leaders are looking to create a county land bank to help deal with foreclosed and abandoned properties. County land banks are entrepreneurial organizations that combine attributes of a government entity and a private enterprise, and they are not… Read more ›
On Monday, March 19, 2012, US Representatives Marcia Fudge and Steve LaTourette were joined by the Cuyahoga Land Bank (President Gus Frangos and Board President Councilman Tony Brancatelli) and others for the Representatives’ announcement of a bill to create bonds… Read more ›
Neighborhoods across America have been devastated by the foreclosure crisis and the homeowners who remain now find themselves in communities speckled with vacant and abandoned homes, which cause the value of their homes to plummet. These are the same neighborhoods… Read more ›
Millions of homeowners have lost their homes to foreclosure because they owed more on them than they were worth. Now a new study from two economists at the Cleveland Federal Reserve suggests that some homeowners in poorer markets are losing… Read more ›
CLEVELAND, OH (WOIO) – Conservative estimates claim there are 26,000 abandoned homes in Cuyahoga County and at least 15,000 are beyond repair and need to be torn down. “It just makes sense people in this neighborhood won’t get relief until… Read more ›
Two Northeast Ohio members of Congress said today they will introduce a bill this evening in the House of Representatives when they return to Washington that would make $4 billion available to the states to help communities swamped by the… Read more ›
Like all of the Cuyahoga Land Bank’s efforts, the Side Lot program is a hit with the neighbors. “People put a picnic table there or a big garden or they fence it in,” says Kimberly Steigerwald, Acquisitions Manager for the… Read more ›
CLEVELAND, Ohio — Cleveland and Cuyahoga County expect to put up $14 million, a little more than previously estimated, in hopes of getting a matching amount for the demolition of blighted homes countywide. The Cuyahoga land bank, the county prosecutor… Read more ›
Cleveland and Cuyahoga county are seeking federal dollars and state money from a national mortgage fraud settlement as a match for the $14 million it is putting up to demolish blighted homes, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reports. They are requesting… Read more ›
Growth in home sales appears to be driven by the willingness of sellers to lower their prices rather than a broad-based increase in demand and buyer confidence, according to an analysis by real estate data and analytics firm Radar Logic… Read more ›
Swelling REO inventories are the latest fallout of the housing crisis, costing lenders money and contributing to neighborhood blight. Yet lenders could avoid taking on so much REO if they could more accurately estimate the value of the homes they… Read more ›
The issue: Vacant buildings Our view: Board must adopt strong public records, public meetings policies Even if foreclosures magically stopped today, Stark County would have more than 14,000 buildings sitting empty, attracting trouble. Some of these houses and other… Read more ›
The Cuyahoga County Land Bank reached two milestones last week: It acquired its 1,500th property and it demolished its 750th. The Land Bank takes over distressed and abandoned properties and either rehabs or demolishes them. The nonprofit land bank, known… Read more ›
While many housing and community activists have long intuited that well-financed “vacant property speculators” were wreaking havoc in their communities — driving down prices, prolonging vacancies and spreading blight — a new study by the Cleveland Fed both substantiates their… Read more ›
(Cleveland) – The Cuyahoga Land Bank hit two milestones this week. It has surpassed 1,500 property acquisitions and 750 demolitions since opening its doors in 2009. The Cuyahoga Land Bank mission is to strategically acquire properties, return them to productive… Read more ›
The members of the Cuyahoga County Land Reutilization Corporation (commonly known as the Cuyahoga Land Bank) Board of Directors charged with selecting new board members and filling vacancies recently named Thomas J. Fitzpatrick IV to the Cuyahoga Land Bank Board.… Read more ›
ELYRIA — City Council heard from an authority on land banking Monday with a presentation from former Cuyahoga County Treasurer Jim Rokakis. Rokakis is now the director of Thriving Communities Initiative, a program of the Western Reserve Land Conservancy. In… Read more ›
