This program will provide up to $20,000 in mortgage payments during a one year time period, with NO apparent requirement for lender match, so successful applicants will indeed have "won" the lottery. (It is not clear to me yet how ability to pay will be reflected in the actual amount of the monthly payment that will be made on behalf of the homeowner and this plus the PITI amount could impact the actual payment made on behalf of the borrower).
(A term sheet for this program is included in the latest term sheets for the 4 HH programs I have previously posted HERE; a sample copy of the request for applications for Multnomah County is HERE; Slot allocations for each county can be found on THIS OHCS webpage).
Estimating the Initial Chances of an Unemployed Family "Winning" a $20,000 Slot.
After reading the Request for Application document my understanding is that the names of all eligible applicants submitted through the chosen intermediaries during a specific time period will be put into a pool and then names will be drawn in a lottery after the window for applications has closed. Because the maximum number of winning slots are limited by each county, the ultimate chances on an individual unemployed homeowner "winning" will be a function of the total eligible applications received from within that county.
While the number of applicants who can enter the lottery will also be limited by a series of other eligibility factors, the chances of winning at the outset can be evaluated using the base of unemployed residents in the county as of September 2010.
OHCS has said that 80% of the $100 Million allocated to this program would be for the 20 hardest hit and/or Housing Distressed counties, so I decided to take a careful look at the data to see how the odds varied throughout the state of "winning" the chance to receive up to $20,000 in help for unemployed borrowers in making their mortgage payments.
I prepared a table HERE with some rather surprising results that show that the initial odds of getting a slot are very much dependent on where you live, even if you live in one of the designated housing distressed or hardest hit counties.
Moreover, the initial chances of getting a slot in a NON hardest hit county are actually better than in some hardest hit/housing distressed counties.
Table Data Show Wide Local Variance in Chances of "Winning" a $20,000 Slot.
- As planned, Oregon HAS allocated 80% of the 5,000 slots to the 20 Hardest Hit or Housing Distressed counties.
- However, within hardest hit counties there is a WIDE variation in the chance/odds of winning a slot in the lottery. In designated Housing Distressed Multnomah County, applicants will have only 7 chances per 1,000 unemployed to get a slot, while in Wallowa county the chances are 395 out of every 1,000 unemployed residents.
- Overall, residents in NON Hardest Hit Counties have a 22 out of 1,000 unemployed chance of winning a lottery slot--that is more than 3 times the chances within Multnomah County, a designated Housing Distressed county, where the slots allocated are only 7 per 1,000 unemployed residents.
- The odds of getting a slot in Jackson County (23 out of 1,000) are slightly WORSE than the overall state odds of 25 out of 1,000), while the initial odds in Deschutes County (35 out of 1,000) are slightly better than the statewide odds.
After the fact it will be very interesting to see:
- The ratio of ACTUAL applications received vs the slots allocated per county;
- Whether these initial ratios of eligible applicants to slots hold up or whether better or worse outreach efforts result in greater or lesser ratios of actual applicants to slots in individual counties;
- Whether any county does NOT use all of its slots.
- At the intermediary, county, and statewide level, the racial and ethnic mix of applicants and those who "win" a slot.
Originally created and posted on the Oregon Housing Blog.
I just found this. I live in Deschutes county, I applied for and was selected for this program. I received my letter stating I was selected for this program Feb. 9.
ReplyDeleteIt is now March 9 and today was the day my home was to go up at auction and I still can not get any answers from anyone. I don't know if my lender has accepted the offer from OHSI, I don't know if My home was sold today, I don't know and can't find out of they auction of my home was stalled or pushed back, I don't know anything and no one can tell me anything.
All the organization handling this program could do was suggest I contact the lender or trustee and forward a copy of the letter to attempt to stall the sale of my home.
I sent a copy of the letter to the trustee, who is the attorney for the party holding the note on my property. I called him yesterday and was told that basically he didn't feel the offer was a viable offer for his client as I owe much more on my home than the 20,000. He also claimed that the 20,000 amount was to be paid in installments over 4 years which I had never heard.
We are now going on the assumption that the house was sold at auction today and we are frantically searching for something to rent.
I feel failed by this program, and the lack of communication. I would assume that in one months time they would have some indication as to whether my lender accepted, was thinking about it or flat turned it down. But no, we were left in Limbo.