Home owners met with a Bank of America negotiator last summer, in hopes of restructuring a mortgage loan.
Bank of America is the bank mentioned in our recent story about lenders suing homeowners for the amount of the mortgage that remains after a foreclosure, but it may be that smaller banks are more likely than large ones to pursue what are called deficiency claims.
Terri Pickens, an attorney with Pickens Law in Boise, has come to that conclusion, based on her experience representing clients who have been served with deficiency judgments. “The small banks pursue everything,” she said. “I have not seen Bank of America pursue them. In my clients’ cases, whether it was a modest house to a multimillion dollar house, they haven’t gone after the deficiency.” Attorney Brian Webb of Angstman Johnson agrees with Pickens’ analysis. Continue Reading →
Take another look at the five stories that got the most clicks this week (it sure got Mugsy-the-dog’s attention)…
In the Wake of Foreclosure, a Debt That Won’t Die: Ben and Lori Jensen thought after they lost their home to foreclosure the ordeal would be over, instead they were sued for the remainder of their home loan. Molly Messick explains why more deficiency judgements are being filed.
Idaho Forest Group Buys Lewiston Sawmill: A Coeur d’Alene company is buying the Clearwater Paper sawmill in Lewiston for $30 million. 250 people will lose their jobs, it’s not clear how many of them will be hired back, or when. Continue Reading →
The Idaho Business Review is reporting north Idaho lawmaker Phil Hart is being sued for nearly $550,000 in unpaid income taxes, penalties and interest. The U.S. government is asking Idaho’s federal district court to sign off on foreclosing some of Hart’s property in Kootenai County.
Hart is a Republican from Hayden, Idaho. He’s serving his fifth term in the Idaho Legislature. IBR.com reports Hart also has a state tax lawsuit awaiting trail in the Idaho Supreme Court.
“He’s also faced ethics hearings in the Legislature, though he avoided a vote after stepping down from the vice chairman position of an Idaho House committee.” – Idaho Business Review
The Idaho Business Review says this latest lawsuit is based on income tax assessments from 1996 to 2008.
“Hart has been a tax protestor, claiming that the government can’t constitutionally collect taxes on his wages, since at least the mid 1990s. He’s gone to court over his federal taxes, including an unsuccessful appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. On a personal website, Hart and his supporters have claimed that he’s paid his taxes since 1997 and that his tax protesting is a fight for freedom.” – Idaho Business Review
At the St. Vincent de Paul food pantry, shelves are emptied by the end of a busy day.
StateImpact Idaho is in the early stages of creating a series about unemployment and underemployment in the state. More specifically, we want to find Idahoans who are willing to talk with us every month or so about how they’re coping through economic circumstances that are uncertain, at best.
In the course of making calls to prepare for this series, I was invited to spend some time at the St. Vincent de Paul food pantry here in Boise. It was a busy day there this Wednesday, with nearly 60 families picking up carts of free food. At least one woman was a first-time visitor. She came in, looking a little uncertain, and said to the nearest volunteer, “Somebody said this was a good place to come for food…” Continue Reading →
Coeur d’Alene-based Idaho Forest Group is purchasing the Clearwater Paper sawmill in Lewiston for $30 million. The Lewiston Tribune has been reporting on the sale throughout the day. The Tribune reports the sale includes Clearwater Paper’s sawmill, planer mill, dry kilns and finished inventories.
“Speculation about the deal had been circulating for more than two weeks in Lewiston. Clearwater Paper spokesman Matt Van Vleet had declined to comment on the pending acquisition multiple times, dismissing the speculation as rumors.” – Lewiston Tribune
After several weeks of reporting on the Idaho housing market, it’s impossible not to notice just how many of the people who have lost their homes in the downturn are real estate agents and builders, or do other kinds of work related to housing. In our first broadcast story, for example, we met Carmel Crock, a realtor who lives in Boise. In the midst of the boom, she made financial decisions that counted on the housing market’s continued strength. She refinanced her home in the expectation that her income would keep rising, allowing her to manage a higher monthly payment.
David McNew / Getty Images News
New home construction stalled at this California development in 2008.
Crock says when her income fell and she found herself in the middle of a financial mess, she wasn’t on her own. Many people she knew professionally were also having to figure out how to negotiate short sales. “Unfortunately, I had realtor friends, long-time acquaintances, builders who were going through the same thing,” she says. “None of us were doing this alone.” Continue Reading →
Ben and Lori Jensen of Meridian say they were stunned to receive a lawsuit from their bank months after they lost their home to foreclosure.
Month in and month out, Idaho’s foreclosure rate remains one of the highest in the nation. For many, losing a home is the definition of hitting bottom. But some former homeowners are finding themselves in an even tighter spot than they thought possible. They’ve lost their homes and wrecked their credit ratings. Now lenders are pursuing them for the debt that remains.
The day Ben Jensen found out that he and his wife, Lori, were being sued for more than $140,000 is fixed in his mind, like the slow-motion moments before a car crash. It was a weekday afternoon, and he’d just come home from work. “My wife and I were standing in the kitchen talking,” he remembers. “There was a knock at the door, she went to get it. And as she was walking back she had a really perplexed look on her face.”
Some Idaho business owners say the same thing: recession or recovery, it doesn’t really matter what it’s called, business is slow. Last week we talked with Idaho economists about this idea. Boise State University economics professor Don Holley says labeling trends “recession” or “recovery” does make a difference. “If we were still (technically) in a recession, if things were still going down, it’d be much worse” Holley says. Still, he points out, two years after the recession, Idaho isn’t back to economic productivity seen at the peak in 2007.
Junkyard Bistro
Mary Whalen and her husband have owned Junkyard Bistro for 4 years.
Mary Whalen co-owns Junkyard Bistro, a small restaurant in Salmon, Idaho. She feels like the recession is hitting her community now. “Our business is way down compared to what it was in 2009,” Whalen says. She says businesses in Salmon rely on the summer tourism season to make ends meet, and because of a long, wet spring, the season didn’t really start until July. “It (business) usually stays strong until November,” Whalen says, “We’ve already cut back our staff.” The move is about six weeks premature. “I almost thought the recession might help us because people weren’t traveling out of the country, but doing local trips,” Whalen says. “You can call it whatever you want to, business is down.” Continue Reading →
Idaho’s unemployment rate ticked down two-tenths of a percent in September, slipping below the national rate for the first time in nearly a year. The state’s seasonally adjusted rate is at 9.0 percent, nationally it’s at 9.1 percent.
Matt Stiles / StateImpact NPR
27 of Idahos 44 counties recorded lower September unemployment rates than in August
Idaho Department of Labor spokesman Bob Fick says many sectors are performing better, or about the same, as they were during Idaho’s economic expansion from 2003-2007. “That suggests that we really have hit the bottom and may finally be starting to, the economy may be starting to claw its way out of the recession into recovery,” says Fick. Continue Reading →
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