New Orleans Set To Demolish 2,500 Homes (homeowners may/may not know)

[rainbow4321]

http://www.local6.com/news/5641734/detail.html

New Orleans is set to demolish about 2,500 hurricane-damaged houses that are deemed threats to public safety.

However, opponents plan to sue to stop the work in an effort to make sure homeowners' rights are respected.

<snip>

But only about 2,500 red-tagged houses that pose an imminent public hazard will be demolished in the next few weeks. The remaining homes will get a second inspection. Officials are trying to locate homeowners to alert them in case they want to remove any belongings before demolition.

The largest concentration of red-tagged houses is in the Lower Ninth Ward.

[Kagemusha]

1. Um seriously. What are the homeowners going to do anyway?

If the houses are condemned, they need to be torn down, either at public expense or private. Public is best given the overall situation.

People raising issues about seizing land are talking about something COMPLETELY different. Land is still land whether a home is standing or demolished on it or not.

[951-Riverside]

5. Live out on the street while the goverment steals their land w/out...

any compensation so "John Dough" cam build his resorts and golf courses with the help of underpaid sla... err illegal immigrants.

[pitohui]

8. see post no. 7

spreading rumors is hurtful, no one wants land in the lower 9th ward for resorts or golf courses, that is just silly, keep going, if you really try, you can end up costing lower middle class people $5K to have to pay themselves to demolish their totalled houses, instead of giving them a chance to get on the list to have their house demolished for free by FEMA

drive around new orleans for a few hours & get back to me

2,500 totalled houses?

that is bullshit, that is the gov't once again going on the cheap, try more like quarter million totalled houses -- and every house NOT demolished by FEMA means the homeowner, who has already lost EVERYTHING, gets to pay another $5K to the contractor for demolition

yes, yes, they are being soooooo thoughtful in not demolishing yr house, that is sooooo thoughtful to screw you out of an extra $5K in your time of worst financial need

sometimes i really do hate people

do the math, having your totalled house demolished for free by FEMA is better than having to pay several thousand dollars to a contractor to do the same identical thing

why is that too advanced for some people?

i have friends begging to be on the list and they haven't been able to


walk a mile in my shoes and get back to me

[BlueJazz]

2. It's about Time! I hope they put up a nice Wal-Mart or ....

..maybe even a Sam's Club with a McDonalds.

[OneBlueSky]

3. wonder if they'll check the attics for dead bodies first . . . n/t

.

[pitohui]

4. here is a red-tagged home in the lower 9th ward

the people trying to prevent the bulldozing of homes have it backward

the reason there are only 2,500 homes red-tagged is because only the most totally destroyed pieces of crap are being bull-dozed

this makes the insurance co. happy, they are now telling people w. destroyed homes, oh no honey, your home can be fixed for only $40K and that's all they're giving people for homes worth twice that, which can't be repaired

it may mean that some people i know have no choice but to go backrupt since they cannot afford to tear down and rebuild and the gov't seems to be colluding to pretend that completely devastated homes are not really totalled

keep in mind state of louisiana is being forced to repay FEMA a percent of all monies spent, our state is broke, officials prob. feel they have no choice but to rate homes as repairable, when they are not, so that FEMA doesn't bill them for bulldozing the home

believe me, the folks whose homes are being bull-dozed early and they're getting closure and the full value of home and contents are the lucky ones

i could just cry on the lies some of my friends have been told, they can't rebuild without having their house declared totalled, yet they can't get action

imagine losing your entire net worth in a minute -- your life savings and everything you've worked for -- in a day

some of these people are too old to start again if they do not get their homes properly red-tagged so they can force the insurer to pay full value of destroyed house & contents

[951-Riverside]

6. I think people are more affraid of having their land stolen than anything.

[pitohui]

7. thank you for not reading a word i said

my friends would actually be better off if their land was "stolen"

they can't afford to have the gov't and the insurance industry pretend their homes are not totalled

refusing to red-tag and bull-doze their homes is a way to cheat them of fair recompense for the insurance they have paid for and also to cheat them of free bull-dozing of their demolished homes

they are going to lose everything financially they have worked for

tens of thousands -- in one case i know personally hundreds of thousands -- of dollars

they are not worried about a $16K lot

they are worried about getting $52K from insurance to pay for a $75K mortgage, then a $5 teardown, then a $100K rebuilding, run the numbers, you can't make up a loss that size in 2 decades of work on a southeast louisiana income, they will have no choice but to declare bankruptcy if they can't get acknowledgement that their homes are totalled

i'd be interested to know what part of orleans parish you're at

i keep hearing these rumors of people who want worthless land w. totalled houses on them, and yet somehow no one i know personally has actually ever met anyone who is actually willing to put money on the table for their land

why do i bother, people would rather believe lies than the truth

if you think the land is so valuable, bring $$$ and come buy some of it, you could be helping some good people out who are otherwise faced w. complete financial ruin, people are already committing suicide when they see it is impossible to regain a middle class lifestyle