Foreclosure rates could worsen

By MARGIE TRAX PAGE - Staff Writer - mtrax@starbeacon.com
Star Beacon

February 08, 2009 12:38 am

— It’s like staring down the barrel of a gun, Janice Switzer said.
The program manager for the Ashtabula County Community Services Office, Switzer holds a thick file folder filled with disheartening statistics.
“Foreclosure, home abandonment, subprime mortgages,” she said. “The list of our county’s housing troubles goes on and on.”
Switzer said the county’s collective housing problems, aggravated by a worsening economy and job losses, are “only going to get worse. I’m afraid.”
“I am not so worried about how bad it is now but really how bad it could be,” she said.
Switzer said the statistics speak for themselves.
“In a lot of areas in this county, 50 percent of loans are subprime,” Switzer said. “It is really sad to see a lot of these cases. In a way, it is like waiting for disaster to strike.”
The county felt a softer foreclosure blow than other areas in 2008, she said.
“The numbers for 2008 weren’t as bad as we anticipated,” Switzer said. “But that sort of leaves us waiting for the shoe to drop, so to speak.”
Switzer said her heart aches for elderly homeowners caught up in the subprime mortgage crisis.
“I am sad for the elderly people who maybe had health issues and refinanced their homes to cover those bills with a subprime mortgage,” Switzer said. “Now, they have a loan in foreclosure when they had almost 100 percent home equity before.”