The Wall Street Journal

By JOE BARRETT

MORROW, Ohio—The housing boom has left the sprawling school district based in this former rail town on the Little Miami River with gleaming new buildings and a dilemma over how to keep them funded.

Three times in the past 15 months, voters have rejected levies that would have kept the Little Miami School District in the black. Each time, the district fell further behind and had to ask for more. On Tuesday, voters will face the biggest request yet—a new real-estate tax that amounts to $519 per $100,000 of assessed value, nearly twice the rate rejected in November.

Backers say the levy, combined with already deep cuts, is the only way to prevent a fiscal emergency that would force a state takeover of the schools. “It’s the downturn of an entire community. People are going to start looking at moving and your property value is going to go through the floor,” said Julie Salmons Perelman, a 44-year-old part-time veterinary technician with three children in the schools, who sat stuffing bags filled with campaign literature one morning last week.

Bill Nicholson, 54, a longtime opponent of the levies, calls the rising requests in the face of repeated rejections “insanity.” In the past, he has argued on behalf of people with fixed incomes, but he recently lost his own job as a consultant in the perfume industry. “How can I cut a budget of zero” to pay more taxes, he asked.

Across the country, fast-growing suburban districts raced during the housing boom to open enough schools. Now many are being forced to make big cuts or ask voters for more money to run them during a housing bust and lingering recession.

“Taxpayers are just not willing to support any sort of an increase,” said Dan Domenech, executive director of the American Association of School Administrators. He said he has recently met with superintendents from Minnesota, Virginia, Florida and California who face similar problems.

The recession has hit Ohio hard, but the state has tried to keep funneling money to education. While state agencies have faced cuts of as much as 30%, most school districts are seeing reductions of 1% this school year and 2% the next.

The 100-square-mile Little Miami School District is home to several older towns like Morrow, population 1,500, horse and soybean farms, and new subdivisions. It is the fastest-growing part of Warren County, about 25 miles north of Cincinnati. The county’s unemployment rate in December was 9.3%, compared with 10.7% statewide.

Since 2002, the district’s student population has grown by 51% to 4,250. To keep pace, local voters approved a special real-estate tax in 2002 and a $62.5 million bond for school construction in 2006.

The district’s budget woes began in July 2007, when a change in state funding formulas cut $6 million over two years. The district’s annual budget is about $30 million.

In November 2008, the school board proposed a 1% levy on earned income, aiming to spare seniors and others on fixed incomes. Voters rejected that 58% to 42%.

In May 2009, the board tried a different tack, with a three-year real-estate levy of about $305 per $100,000 of assessed value.

High-school students lined up at a main intersection in the district to remind people to vote. Opponents paid for a billboard urging a “no” vote.

After that measure failed by the same margin, the district closed two elementary schools; cut 82 positions, bringing staff levels down to 385; and slashed art, music and physical-education classes for kindergarten through fourth grade.

Meanwhile, district officials braced for the triennial property tax assessment, which had been growing by 22% to 28%. The 2009 reassessment showed a 9% drop.

That widened the projected budget gap, and the board proposed a rising five-year levy on last November’s ballot. The new proposal started at $243 per $100,000 of assessed value and gradually rose to $397 in year five. Backers launched a Facebook group and purchased the opposite side of the billboard that opponents were advertising on.

The margin of defeat narrowed to 52% to 48%, but opponents prevailed again.

Today, Little Miami High School still looks brand new, but parts appear abandoned. Bookshelves in the library are cordoned off, because there are no aides to check books in and out. Rows of monitors and hard drives go unused in a former computer lab.

Math teacher Roger Levo’s algebra class, with 38 students, is more crowded than ever. “I didn’t think it was going to work,” he said of the biggest class he has taught in his 27 years in the district. He pointed to five chairs he brought in to supplement the 33 desks. “They rotate,” he said.

The latest levy request is higher because collections wouldn’t begin until next January. This school year, the district expects a deficit of $1.7 million. Without a levy, the deficit next year would grow to between $5 million and $6 million.

Opponents such as Bill Brausch, a 65-year-old landscaper, have put up hand-painted signs throughout the community. He advocates a combination of salary cuts, private fund raising and a return to the idea of the 1% tax on earned income defeated 15 months ago.

“What they want is this pot of gold,” Mr. Brausch said of the school board. “They’re beating a dead horse.”

Dayton Daily News

By Tim Tresslar, Staff Writer

DAYTON — The median price for single-family homes in the four-county Dayton area rose 21 percent in the fourth quarter compared to the last three months of 2008, a new report says.

In the fourth quarter of 2009, a home’s median price — half cost more, half cost less — in the Dayton metropolitan statistical area rose to $106,400, according to the National Association of Realtors. In comparison, the median price in the final quarter of 2008 was $87,800.

The Dayton MSA includes Greene, Miami, Montgomery and Preble counties.

Other major cities in Ohio also saw a jump in median prices. In Cincinnati, the price rose 7.8 percent to $125,000 while in Columbus it grew 4.7 percent to $132,500.

For the year, the median price in the area slipped 2.78 percent to $105,000, versus $108,000 in 2008, according to the Dayton Area Board of Realtors. But in October, November and December, prices climbed significantly over the corresponding months in 2008, according to DABR statistics.

“The prices are stabilizing,” Jess Livesay, vice president and chief executive of the board, said Friday, Feb. 12.

One thing that has benefited the region is that local home values didn’t skyrocket at dramatic levels seen in other parts of the country and didn’t fall as far as they have in other areas, Livesay said.

Nationally, median prices fell to $172,900 or 4.1 percent, the smallest year-over-year drop in two years and prices should continue to improve, NAR officials said.

“Because buyers are taking on long-term fixed-rate mortgages, avoiding adjustable-rate products and trying to stay within their budgets, the price recovery process appears durable,” Lawrence Yun, an economist with NAR.

Staff writer Tim Tresslar covers commercial and residential real estate for Dayton Daily News. His Real Estate Notebook appears every Sunday. He can be reached at (937) 225-7317 or via e-mail at ttresslar@coxohio.com.

Dayton Daily News

By Tim Tresslar, Staff Writer

DAYTON — Foreclosure filings, which had been waning locally, surged by 51.7 percent in January in the four-county Dayton metro area, according to a report released Thursday, Feb. 11.

In January, 1,420 properties in the Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) received a default or auction notice or were seized, versus 936 during the same month a year ago, said Irvine, Calif.-based RealtyTrac Inc. One in 269 homes received a filing in January.

Daren Blomquist, a spokesman for RealtyTrac, said the January numbers mark the largest monthly total recorded by his company for Dayton since November 2007.

“It’s probably too early to say with just one month under our belt that somehow there’s a second wave of foreclosures happening in Dayton,” Blomquist said. “But if this trend continues over the next few months, that would probably be interpreted that we’re seeing a kind of resurgence, a second wave of foreclosure activity there.”

Montgomery County Recorder Willis Blackshear said foreclosures will continue to spike this year as lenders back away from limits they placed on themselves while they waited for state lawmakers to approve a law establishing a moratorium. Two anti-foreclosure measures passed the Ohio House in 2009, but not the Senate, Blackshear said.

“If it’s not going to move through the state legislature, what motivation is there for these banks and mortgage companies to do what the state legislature won’t do?” he said.

Blackshear said he expects the county’s caseload to grow this year and continue rising through 2013.

“This thing is nowhere near over,” he said.

During the first month of 2010, foreclosure filings increased in Miami, Montgomery and Preble counties, but subsided in Greene County, compared to the same month in 2009, according to RealtyTrac.

One area of concern for 2011, he said, is the workers displaced by the 2008 closing of the General Motors’ truck assembly plant in Moraine who are receiving a percentage of their pay over two years may end up in foreclosure when those benefits end. Another complicating factor, he said, is that even those who wind up in new careers may find themselves making less than they did as GM workers.

Beth Deutscher, executive director for the Homeownership Center of Greater Dayton, said she was surprised by the jump in filings. Her agency is working with dozens of troubled homeowners and their lenders to get their mortgage terms changed permanently through the federal government’s Making Home Affordable program, she said. Once a borrower applies for a permanent modification, lenders aren’t supposed to push forward with foreclosure proceedings, she said.

Statewide, foreclosure filings in Ohio fell by less than 1 percent over the same period last year. And across the country the number of filings jumped by 15 percent in a year-over-year comparison.

Locally, the change between December 2009 and last month was even greater, RealtyTrac said.

In the Dayton MSA, the number of properties against which filings were made grew to 1,420 from 810 in December, a 75.3 percent gain, RealtyTrac said.

Source: Columbia Business First

RealtyTrac Inc. on Thursday cautioned that communities should brace for a surge in foreclosures in the coming few months following a drop in mortgage failures nationally in January, including in Ohio.

The Irvine, Calif.-based company, which compiles and sells foreclosure data, said it tracked 11,105 default, auction and bank repossession notices on properties in Ohio last month. That represented one filing for every 457 households, below the national ratio of one foreclosure for every 409 households.

Ohio foreclosure activity fell 5 percent from December but dipped less than 1 percentage point from a year earlier. National foreclosure activity, meanwhile, tumbled 10 percent from December but surged 15 percent from January 2009, RealtyTrac said.

Ohio wasn’t among the 10 states with the highest foreclosure rates in January, ranking 14th, but the volume of foreclosure filings was the ninth-highest in the nation. California, Florida and Arizona, where housing development exploded in the late 1990s and earlier this decade, continued to account for more than 40 percent of foreclosures among the states.

RealtyTrac CEO James Saccacio said last month’s activity – a drop in filings following a December surge – mimicked the direction of foreclosures a year ago.

“If history repeats itself, we will see a surge in the numbers over the next few months as lenders foreclose on delinquent loans where neither the existing loan modification programs or the new short sale and deed-in-lieu of foreclosure alternatives works,” Saccacio said in a release.

January 29, 2010
by Ohio RealEstateRama

A two-year investigation by the Greater Cincinnati Mortgage Fraud Task Force has resulted in a seven-count indictment charging two Cincinnati area home builders, a former Huntington National Bank vice president, and a self-employed tax preparer and interior designer with participating in a mortgage fraud scheme to sell four high-end luxury properties to “straw buyers.” A straw buyer is someone who is listed as the owner of a house, but is not really the one buying the house.

Carter M. Stewart, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio, Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray, Warren County Prosecuting Attorney Rachel Hutzel, and Keith L. Bennett, Special Agent in Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and other task force participants announced the indictment today.

The grand jury returned charges against:

Eric D. Duke, 35, Newport, Kentucky. Duke is a self-employed tax preparer and interior designer. He also owned a property management company called Rivendale Property Management Group, L.P., in Maineville, Ohio.

Terrence J. Monahan Jr., 36, Cincinnati, formerly with Huntington National Bank.

Bernard J. Kurlemann, 56, of Mason, owner of Kurlemann Homes of Long Cove and Long Cove Management, LLC.

Bryan Sanneman, 38, of Mason, owner of Sanneman Homes, Inc.

The charges stem from the sale of four residential properties in 2006 to 2007, three of which were sold for approximately $2 million each. The indictment alleges that Monahan, Sanneman, and Kurlemann, each conspired with Duke to defraud lenders involved with the sales.

The scheme, as alleged in the indictment, involved Duke locating two people willing to buy the properties in name only and let their names be used on loan applications. The indictment alleges that Duke worked with a mortgage broker who submitted fraudulent loan applications that contained false income and assets. According to the indictment, Monahan gave Duke a customer bank account statement to be used as a “go-by” to create fictitious account statements to support fraudulent assets on the loan applications.

The indictment also alleges that Sanneman and Kurlemann provided documentation to the lenders falsely stating that they had received down payments from the borrowers when they had not. The indictment alleges that the defendants conspired with Duke to have the fraudulent loans approved in order to sell their properties.

The indictment alleges that the defendants benefitted from the scheme because they were able to sell their expensive properties, get out from under substantial mortgages, and receive additional loan proceeds.

The indictment charges all four defendants with conspiracy. Duke and Monahan are charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and wire fraud, both crimes punishable by up to 20 years imprisonment.

Duke and Kurlemann are charged with conspiracy to commit loan fraud, punishable by up to five years imprisonment, and two counts of loan fraud. Each count of loan fraud is punishable by up to 30 years imprisonment.

Duke and Sanneman are charged with conspiracy to commit loan fraud and loan fraud.

The indictment also seeks forfeiture of any property or assets derived as a result of the crimes.

Loan proceeds from the alleged fraud totaled approximately $6.7 million.

Charges have been filed separately against the straw buyers. Francisca Webster, 46, of Cincinnati, has been charged in a separate information, with conspiracy to commit wire fraud punishable by up to 30 years imprisonment. Christopher Gagnon, 37, of Florence, Kentucky has been charged with loan fraud, punishable by up to 30 years imprisonment.

Stewart commended the investigation by the Greater Cincinnati Mortgage Fraud Task Force. The Greater Cincinnati Mortgage Fraud Task Force is a multi-agency, multi-jurisdictional initiative dedicated to combating the mortgage fraud problem in the Southern District of Ohio.

The defendants will be summoned for their initial appearances before a U.S. Magistrate Judge.

The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Jennifer C. Barry, and Special Assistant United States Attorneys Bruce McGary of the Warren County Prosecutor’s Office and Christopher Wagner with Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray’s Office.

An indictment is merely an accusation. All defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty in court.