Problems with empty, foreclosed, or otherwise house-poor homes once stopped at suburban sprawl and undervalued new real estate. Now there’s a new nightmare on the block: infestations.
When people can’t afford to keep up their home maintenance — or their homeowners’ insurance — infrastructure begins to decay. Squatters waiting out the recession in a home once worth a hundred thousand dollars find themselves in the midst of a homeowner’s nightmare as walls quickly crumble beyond repair.
Check out this video of a house so filled with bees that the walls are dripping with honey: video link here.
Here’s honey dripping down from the hole in the wall for the electrical socket:
(Photos here from KSBW, via BLDGBLOG)
If an apiary infestation doesn’t sound enough like a treehouse of horror, consider the home value havoc wreaked by previous mortgage stalls.
In 2008, homeowners in Los Angeles were horrified to find mosquitos infected with the West Nile virus breeding in their abandoned swimming pools:
During the economic good times a few years ago, swimming pools were status symbols. Now, in neighborhoods across metro Atlanta, they’ve become expensive albatrosses for many struggling homeowners and subdivisions. And a headache for neighbors and regulators.
The neglected pools are breeding grounds for mosquitoes, which can carry diseases like West Nile virus. This at a time when the economic downturn has left local governments with less money to fight this potentially deadly foe, and legal obstacles posed by foreclosures and bank failures can slow what efforts are being made.
“We’re seeing a sharp spike in abandoned pools and the mosquito problems that are attendant to it. I haven’t seen it to any extent approaching this [previously],” said Joseph Conlon, technical adviser for the American Mosquito Control Association in Jacksonville. “In the past, we’ve had people abandon their home or go on vacation. It was just a case of bad neighbors. In this case, it’s driven economically.”
A less tropical, equally dangerous infestation also colored the last mortgage-driven recession: Wildcats. Bobcats took over foreclosed Long Beach homes in 2008, a natural move for the wildcats when abandoned homes promised shelter from the elements sans human interference.
If the problems of Money Manipulation and Too Big To Fail don’t scare you out of supporting predatory lending mores, look to the wildcats and viruses and bankruptcy (oh my!) that haunt the permissive mortgage market.
Don’t spend more than you can afford, folks; West Nile Virus-filled swimming pools don’t exactly promise climbing real estate values moving forward!
