Maryland unveiled just this Wednesday of its move to prevent foreclosure and to keep homeowners inside their houses. It has designated more than $2.5 million to address this problem. This fund has come from different funding sources, which include federal, local and state sources. This fund is specifically for supporting homeowners who are currently facing foreclosure threats.
According to Martin O’Malley, Maryland governor, the primary beneficiaries of this fund are the nonprofit housing counseling associations and organizations. O’Malley also outlined almost $1.8 million worth of fund for the National Foreclosure Mitigation Council or NFMC. Raymond A. Skinner also added that $240,000 worth of fund from Montgomery County is dedicated to help housing counseling agencies that are operating in that place.
The Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development currently supports a network that is made up of 30 nonprofit housing counseling agencies and another two nonprofit providers of legal services. This is part of the Home Ownership Preserving Equity (HOPE) Initiative.
The announcement of this funding comes after the DHCD released a report stating that the first quarter of 2009 had a decreased number of foreclosures in Maryland, amounting to 9,829 house units. This is a 7.5 decrease from the last quarter, and a decrease of 18.5 from the same period one year ago.
So far, Maryland has already given more than $5.5 million worth of assistance to threatened homeowners since 2007. The network of housing counseling groups has already given assistance to around 23,000 consumers and has already given help to more than 6,800 homeowners to prevent foreclosure. Through the Foreclosure Pro Bono Project that is implemented in the entire state of Maryland, more than 700 attorneys have already volunteered their efforts and time to help threatened homeowners to stay away from, and stop foreclosure, by providing the necessary legal assistance that they need.
Skinner further added that the housing counseling help available to all homeowners in Maryland has been a great help to prevent foreclosure. Aside from being great examples to the whole industry in providing the right information and assistance to homeowners, these organizations also perform the role as advocates of protecting families, keeping them in their homes, and helping them prevent foreclosure. With this, Skinner commended and lauded these organizations for doing a great job.