Rehabs For Charity

Overall, neighborhoods in the middle are attractive and in good repair. They usually consist of long blocks of modest but well-maintained rowhouses or clusters of single-family frame houses on tree-shaded lots. Unfortunately, these neighborhoods are too often remembered for problem properties on the busiest streets or for the odd oversized or poorly built dwellings. Such troubled properties often are slow to sell, are readily converted to marginal rental units, and are the first to be abandoned. Moreover, even when sales prices are stable, too many houses are so undervalued that it doesn’t make economic sense for homeowners to upgrade them significantly. The resulting disinvestment erodes confidence, discourages neighborhood leaders, and undermines even simple acts of neighborliness and cooperation among residents.

Every property owner decides whether an improvement makes sense in light of local housing values. In neighborhoods where the cost of upgrading a kitchen and bath exceeds the total value of the property, there is a strong disincentive for homeowners to make improvements.  In fact, the disincentive can be so powerful that even necessary repairs are delayed or done at a minimal level.

Healthy neighborhoods are places where it makes sense for residents to invest their time, effort, and money and where neighbors are willing and able to manage everyday community issues.  As more and more houses are renovated and brought back to life, all neighbors benefit from increased home equity (increased sales prices, increased appraisal values, and expanded investment in home improvements) and a strengthening of social fabric (broadened civic participation, change the language used to describe neighborhoods, and promoting neighborhoods as neighborly places).