Loan crisis hurts Brooklyn renters, too
By Matthew Lysiak, Elizabeth Hays and Veronika Belankaya - NY Daily News
By Matthew Lysiak, Elizabeth Hays and Veronika Belankaya - NY Daily News
Tenant Yvette Hazel (l.) and landlord Karen Smith talk on the stoop of Smith's brownstone on Fiske St. in Park Slope. A judge has given Smith and Hazel a 30-day reprieve from foreclosure.
Single mom Kelly Ortiz thought she had finally made it out of the city's shelter system when she moved her family to a rental apartment in a small East New York house.
Now, the two-family home is in foreclosure, and Ortiz has to find a new apartment in a month — or return to the shelter.
"It does affect us, the tenants. We get attached to our apartments," said Ortiz, 27, of the mortgage crisis that has swept the country.
While homeowners are the most obvious victims, thousands of city renters like Ortiz are being forced from their homes into a housing market with growing rents.
"How will I find a new place?" said Ortiz, who pays $1,300 a month for the two-bedroom apartment. "We are suffering because the mortgages are so high. That's why the rents are so high. The landlords have to meet certain payments every month."
Brooklyn had the most renters affected by the mortgage crisis in the city last year, a New York University Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy study found.
More than 7,000 residents lost their apartments in foreclosed Brooklyn homes last year, compared with 3,723 in Queens, 2,483 in the Bronx, 1,111 in Manhattan and 488 on Staten Island.
"When you think of foreclosure, you don't think of renters, but if the owners lose their homes, the renters are usually evicted," said Councilman Charles Barron (D-East New York), whose district was second-hardest hit in the borough after Bedford-Stuyvesant.
Carmen Melendez knows that all too well. She gave up after five years of fighting to keep her East New York apartment because her landlord lost the six-unit building after becoming unable
to keep up with the monthly payments. The new owner wants her out.
"I don't want to move. But I am really tired, and I cannot keep going through this," said Melendez, whose building fell into disrepair over a span of five years without a stable owner.
"Every winter we had no heat, and for weeks we'd go without hot water."
At Brooklyn Housing Court, Park Slope landlord Karen Smith and her tenant, Yvette Hazel, breathed a sigh of relief as the judge yanked their Fiske Place home off the auction block, but only for a month.
"Imagine - some days you just don't know if you're going to have a home to come back to," Smith said. "A few months ago, someone came and tried to padlock my doors."
Hazel was glad for the reprieve, but worried about the future.
"Nothing about the process is fair," she said.
"If we lose the apartment, I am packing up and moving to California."
Single mom Kelly Ortiz thought she had finally made it out of the city's shelter system when she moved her family to a rental apartment in a small East New York house.
Now, the two-family home is in foreclosure, and Ortiz has to find a new apartment in a month — or return to the shelter.
"It does affect us, the tenants. We get attached to our apartments," said Ortiz, 27, of the mortgage crisis that has swept the country.
While homeowners are the most obvious victims, thousands of city renters like Ortiz are being forced from their homes into a housing market with growing rents.
"How will I find a new place?" said Ortiz, who pays $1,300 a month for the two-bedroom apartment. "We are suffering because the mortgages are so high. That's why the rents are so high. The landlords have to meet certain payments every month."
Brooklyn had the most renters affected by the mortgage crisis in the city last year, a New York University Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy study found.
More than 7,000 residents lost their apartments in foreclosed Brooklyn homes last year, compared with 3,723 in Queens, 2,483 in the Bronx, 1,111 in Manhattan and 488 on Staten Island.
"When you think of foreclosure, you don't think of renters, but if the owners lose their homes, the renters are usually evicted," said Councilman Charles Barron (D-East New York), whose district was second-hardest hit in the borough after Bedford-Stuyvesant.
Carmen Melendez knows that all too well. She gave up after five years of fighting to keep her East New York apartment because her landlord lost the six-unit building after becoming unable
to keep up with the monthly payments. The new owner wants her out.
"I don't want to move. But I am really tired, and I cannot keep going through this," said Melendez, whose building fell into disrepair over a span of five years without a stable owner.
"Every winter we had no heat, and for weeks we'd go without hot water."
At Brooklyn Housing Court, Park Slope landlord Karen Smith and her tenant, Yvette Hazel, breathed a sigh of relief as the judge yanked their Fiske Place home off the auction block, but only for a month.
"Imagine - some days you just don't know if you're going to have a home to come back to," Smith said. "A few months ago, someone came and tried to padlock my doors."
Hazel was glad for the reprieve, but worried about the future.
"Nothing about the process is fair," she said.
"If we lose the apartment, I am packing up and moving to California."
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