Vacant Property Registration

And on to more relevant news… The Kansas City, Mo. City Council will vote this week on a proposal that will require owners of vancant properties to register with the city. The Star reports that this proposal allows a generous 120 days before the vacant property must be registered, and is primarily targeted at absentee banks who own foreclosed properties and do not maintain them properly:

“Council members said the effort is at least partly aimed at going after mortgage and foreclosure companies, to make sure they maintain properties after the occupants are forced out.”

I am in support of this city proposal – these banks are ruining property values in neighborhoods by shutting off utilities and allowing properties to deteriorate, then selling them for pennies thereby decreasing the values in our city neighborhoods. I have sounded-off on bank foreclosures in a previous post, so I will stop here before I get into ranting territory. I just hope the city can follow through once they have the registrations, though with all the proposed budgetary and job cuts at city hall, I am not sure who is going to manage this information.