NEWS & EVENTS
NEWS
Nov. 26, 2022
If a homeowner dies without a trust or a will, transferring the title to an heir can be a complicated process involving probate court. And "tangled titles” can have repercussions for metro Detroit families and their neighborhoods.
"The need is far greater than what we can provide," says Michigan Legal Services attorney Alyssa Petroni. "Probate can be done without an attorney, but it's much easier with legal help."
For the full story in the Detroit Free Press, click the link below.
Nov. 18, 2022
The City of Detroit has chosen UCHC to manage its new eviction defense program, which will provide free lawyers for low-income Detroiters facing eviction.
For the full story from the Detroit Free Press, click the link below.
Nov. 9, 2022
UCHC's annual dinner is set to take place on Thursday, Nov. 17, at the International Institute of Metro Detroit. Come celebrate a year’s worth of accomplishments in Detroit and learn about the latest developments in eviction and foreclosure prevention.
This year's keynote speaker will be Kim Trent, Deputy Director for Prosperity of the Michigan Poverty Task Force. Shawn Jacque, General Counsel for 36th District Court, will give us an update on the changes in Detroit’s eviction court over the last year.
For more info, click the link below.
Nov. 2, 2022
Detroiters say home repairs are their top priority. According to a study by the University of Michigan, an estimated 37,630 Detroit homes need major repairs. For 13% of those households, the level of repair has reached hazardous conditions.
ABJ and Bridge Detroit examine the impact that unmet home repairs have on the city’s neighborhoods. For the full story, click the link below.
Oct. 13, 2022
The Rocket Community Fund, Mayor Mike Duggan, Detroit City Council, and UCHC celebrated our groundbreaking Make It Home program Thursday at UCHC's offices in Cass Park, paying tribute to homeowner Barbara Sledge and the 238 other Detroit residents who recently became homeowners.
For the full story from WDIV, click the link below:
Oct. 7, 2022
Detroit officials on Friday unveiled a $16 million mixed-use affordable housing development, which will provide a safe haven for LGBTQ+ youth.
For the full story from the Detroit Metro Times, click the link below.
Oct. 5, 2022
Amid rising housing costs and widespread poverty, local developers and city officials are thinking about redefining the term "affordable housing" to more accurately reflect the city's conditions.
For the full story from Axios Detroit, click the link below.
Sept. 30, 2022
The second round of a city home repair program, slated to help 1,000 Detroiters with window or roof work, kicks off Saturday and runs through the end of October.
The Renew Detroit program, funded by $45 million in American Rescue Plan Act dollars, covers home repairs for 2,000 low-income seniors and Detroiters with disabilities.
For the full story from the Detroit Free Press, click the link below.
Sept. 16, 2022
More than half of disabled Michiganders are struggling financially. In 2019, more than 650,000 people with disabilities in Michigan lived in poverty or were unable to afford the essentials — housing, child care, food, transportation, and health care.
For the full story from the Detroit Free Press, click the link below.
Sept. 14, 2022
It can be a real challenge for disabled people to find a place to live. That problem is particularly acute in Detroit, which has a higher percentage of disabled people than the rest of the state.
“We know that our population is getting older, and our single-family housing is, too," says Detroit Housing & Revitalization Department director Julie Schneider. "So there is definitely a need for more accessible housing in the city."
For the full story from Outlier Media, click the link below.
Sept. 8, 2022
You can expect more banks to start offering mortgages that don't require some first-time buyers to save up a large down payment — part of an effort to close the racial and ethnic homeownership gap, which is a big piece of the racial wealth gap.
For the full story from Axios Detroit, click the link below.
Sept. 7, 2022
There are many good reasons to know more about your landlord. Detroit has seen a legion of rental scam cases and landlords failing to maintain their properties. Information about a property’s tax status and history of blight violations can help protect renters from eviction or from signing a lease with an unscrupulous landlord.
So where should you start? This week, Outlier Media examines how to research a Detroit landlord.
Aug. 30, 2022
Rising mortgage rates and lingering inflation are forcing many Americans to put plans to buy a home on hold. That's pushing up rent prices for others. As PBS economics correspondent Paul Solman explains, no one has experienced that more acutely over the last year than people of color.
For the full story from PBS NewsHour, click the link below.
Aug. 29, 2022
Detroit purchased the tax-foreclosed homes from the Wayne County Treasurer with donated funds from the Rocket Community Fund and transferred the properties to the nonprofit United Community Housing Coalition. UCHC sold the properties to the tenants via quit claim deeds or 0% interest land contracts.
Since the initiative's beginning, the city has helped nearly 1,200 households in Detroit.
For the full story in The Detroit News, click the link below.
Aug. 24, 2022
The Michigan State Housing Development Authority (MSHDA) has announced a plan to distribute more than $63 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding to support homeless and at-risk people across the state of Michigan. If approved by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), the money will be used for affordable housing, eviction prevention, and financial assistance to help families experiencing homelessness find new housing.
For the full story from Michigan Radio, click the link below.
Aug. 23, 2022
About 1,000 non-owner-occupied homes in Detroit, including rental properties, went into tax foreclosure this year — a big uptick from right before the COVID-19 pandemic hit.
At the same time, the number of owner-occupied properties in the city that are headed to the Wayne County Treasurer's fall auction this year remains around pre-pandemic levels — an indicator that programs meant to keep those homes from foreclosure are working.
For the full story from the Detroit Free Press, click the link below.
Aug. 18, 2022
According to longtime property-tax analyst Alex Alsup, the number of chronically tax-delinquent homeowners in the city of Detroit has fallen 60%, from 17,000 in 2017 to 6,300 this year. Most often, it’s Detroit homeowners — not landlords or the owners of vacant property — who are catching up on old property-tax debt.
For the full story from Outlier Media, click the link below:
Aug. 16, 2022
Renters and housing advocates aim to form a citywide tenants association to push for safe, affordable housing in Detroit. The Detroit Tenants Association would be a start for renters in the city to protect themselves, says Steven Rimmer, coordinator of the Tenants Association of New Center Plaza. Rent prices, he says, are rising and displacing longtime Detroiters.
"It's just been a struggle," says Detroit resident M. Lewis Bass, who is on a fixed income and has been a renter for 49 years.
For the full story from the Detroit Free Press, click the link below:
Aug. 15, 2022
"Detroit is a majority renter city, but information like how many rental properties there are and who owns them is limited, leaving gaps when it comes to improving housing conditions and reducing lead exposure from paint."
For the full story from Bridge Detroit, click the link below:
Aug. 8, 2022
National Low Income Housing president Diane Yentel told a U.S. Senate committee last week that the average U.S. minimum-wage worker would need to work 96 hours a week to afford rent on a two-bedroom home or 79 hours a week just to afford the rent of a one-bedroom home at the fair market rate.
Read the full story at the link below from the Iowa Capital Dispatch.
July 31, 2022
Ted Phillips, executive director of the Detroit-based United Community Housing Coalition, says the CERA program was the difference between being in the shelters, on the streets, in a car or in an abandoned building.
“There’s a lot to do," he says, "but we can’t throw up our hands.”
For the full story in the Detroit Free Press, click the link below:
May 17, 2022
Evictions disproportionately affect households headed by Black women, seniors, and people with disabilities, but Detroit City Council President Mary Sheffield says a new Right to Counsel law set to take effect in Detroit will help stabilize the city's neighborhoods.
“Out of the 30,000 eviction cases in Detroit, only 4% of those tenants had an attorney,” Sheffield says. “Half of all of the evictions that took place in Detroit could have been avoided if they had an attorney."
Click the link below for the full story from WDET.
May 3, 2022
The Gilbert Family Foundation, along with ProMedica and DTE Energy, announced a $20 million home-repair fund today that they anticipate will help more than 1,000 Detroit homeowners over the next three years.
Click the link below for the full story from The Detroit News.
April 19, 2022
Detroit City Council president Mary Sheffield says she and her colleagues are working hard to address a longstanding issue of overassessed taxes in the city of Detroit. This large overestimate is impacting thousands of homeowners.
Click the link below to watch the full report from WXYZ-TV, Channel 7.
March 31, 2022
A ruling issued Tuesday by a Wayne County judge will keep some owner-occupied properties out of tax foreclosure for the next year. Judge Timothy Kenny agreed to extend the redemption period through March 31, 2023, due to the continued impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the availability of federal funds. The order does not apply to property owners with tax debt in 2016 or prior years.
For the full story in The Detroit News, click the link below.
March 23, 2022
The March 31 deadline for Wayne County residents to avoid foreclosure is fast approaching. People with property tax debt from 2019 or prior years have until the end of the month to pay off their back taxes or enter into a payment plan with the Treasurer’s office before their property goes to auction in the fall.
For the full story from the Detroit Free Press, click the link below.
March 22, 2022
While occupied foreclosures have been declining in Detroit, the number of non-owner foreclosures has been rising, leaving tenants in the crosshairs of Wayne County's annual auction. | Bridge Detroit
For the full story, click the link below.
March 15, 2022
UCHC executive director Ted Phillips recently spoke with WDET's Russ McNamara to discuss Wayne County's upcoming foreclosure deadline and the movement for a right to legal representation for low-income Detroiters who can't afford their own counsel.
To listen to the interview, click the link below.
March 14, 2022
“A disaster is headed for Wayne County," says the Freep's Nancy Kaffer, "but Eric Sabree can stop it. Sabree, the county treasurer, could ask a Wayne County Circuit Court judge to halt the tax foreclosures of more than 4,000 owner-occupied homes. … Sabree has asked the court to halt foreclosures before. He can do it again.”
For the full story, click the link below.
March 9, 2022
UCHC executive director Ted Phillips is filling in this week as guest curator of Outlier Media's weekly housing and real estate newsletter, "The Dig." Along with Ted's insightful editorial on Wayne County's upcoming March 31 property-tax foreclosure deadline, this week's issue also features a compelling interview with attorney Tonya Myers Phillips, who's working with local housing advocates to bring a “Right to Counsel” law to Detroit.
For the full story, click the link below.
Feb. 14, 2022
The new $243 million Michigan Homeowner Assistance Fund aims to help Michiganders stay in their homes, including homeowners with land contracts, reports Bridge Detroit.
UCHC executive director Ted Phillips says he's hopeful the program will hit the ground running because many people could lose their homes if action isn't taken fairly quickly.
For the full story, click the link below.
Feb. 7, 2022
Last summer, heavy rain flooded thousands of basements in Detroit and the city was honest about what happened — the pumps just couldn’t keep up. On Monday, Mayor Mike Duggan announced a new effort to get into homes and install new equipment to keep basements dry.
To watch the video report from Channel 4, click the link below.
Feb. 7, 2022
Amid a national housing crisis, giant private equity firms have been buying up apartment buildings en masse to squeeze them for profit, with the help of government-backed Freddie Mac. Meanwhile tenants say they’re the ones paying the price.
To read the full story from ProPublica, click the link below:
Jan. 28, 2022
The Wayne County Treasurer's Office is expected to resume all tax foreclosures this year, and taxpayers are encouraged to get on a payment plan before March 14 if needed.
"This year, we're foreclosing," says Wayne County Treasurer Eric Sabree. "We're not making any special category on what we're not going to do. Everything that's scheduled for foreclosure is on schedule for foreclosure."
To read the full story in the Detroit Free Press, click the link below:
June 8, 2020
"Local housing supporters expect Detroit’s 36th District Court to face an influx of eviction notices when the governor’s order prohibiting evictions ends this week. Less than half of city residents own their home and many households are financially unstable given the number of job losses due to the coronavirus pandemic."
Senate Dems / April 6, 2020
“As we all hear that the coronavirus is particularly fatal for seniors, it is often the low-income seniors — the most vulnerable of the senior population, living in multiple dwelling units — that are left to fend for themselves,” said Claudia Sanford, Director of Tenant Organizing for the United Community Housing Coalition and Chair of Senior Housing Preservation-Detroit. “Staying at home is not always possible and social distancing in buildings of more than 200 seniors and disabled individuals with only two elevators is not possible. The donation of surgical masks to the United Community Housing Coalition for distribution will make it possible for low-income seniors to have a better chance at survival during this crisis. This is the kind of help and leadership that is needed during a pandemic.”
Yahoo! Fiance / April 3, 2020
"In mid-March, Quicken Loans Community Fund (QLCF) and the Gilbert Family Foundation committed $1.2 million to address local COVID-19 impacts — including $500,000 to the United Way, $250,000 to the United Community Housing Coalition to address housing effects, and $450,000 to float small businesses."
MetroTimes / March 24, 2020
"Last week, the Wayne County Treasurer announced a total moratorium on tax foreclosures for the year 2020 due to the state of emergency caused by the coronavirus pandemic. Suddenly, the pressure was off for over 12,000 properties, including 8,000 occupied homes in Detroit that were likely to be foreclosed this year."
Bridge MI / March 21, 2020
"United Community Housing Coalition is helping answer questions regarding a landlord-tenant or other eviction matter in Detroit. If you need assistance call (313) 355-3352 or email UCHC at eviction@uchcdetroit.org."
Curbed Detroit / March 16, 2020
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"Renter-occupied households now make up about 44 percent of living spaces in Detroit, according to a December 2019 estimate by the apartment listing site RentCafé. In an even more dramatic finding, a Detroit Future City study found that around 2017 the number of renters actually surpassed the number of homeowners in Detroit for the first time since 1950."
Detroit News / March 16, 2020
"The Quicken Loans Community Fund and Gilbert Family Foundation on Monday announced a combined $1.2 million donation to help vulnerable residents and small businesses hurt by the coronavirus pandemic."
Michigan News / March 9, 2020
"The work that I do with Poverty Solutions is done closely with Detroit’s United Community Housing Coalition, where we focus on applied housing policy research and program evaluation. In some form, all of my current work revolves around the injustice of property tax foreclosures in the city of Detroit. In 2017, I worked with both Poverty Solutions and the United Community Housing Coalition on a project that examined Detroit’s Poverty Tax Exemption, a program that exempts residents with low incomes from their property tax obligation. We found that 40,000 people were eligible for the program, and only about 4,000 were receiving it."
Curbed Detroit / March 9, 2020
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“Here’s the problem: rents in the city continue to rise, which means these deals get harder to make every year because the incentives to remove low-income folks get more profitable,” Duggan said at a press conference announcing the partnership. “We said, ‘To save [more affordable units], we need a little help.’”
Rebusiness Online / March 10, 2020
"Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan and his Housing & Revitalization Department (HRD) have created a new partnership to preserve affordable housing in the city while also improving its quality and preventing displacement. The partnership comprises the city’s housing department along with a number of housing experts, including Enterprise Community Partners, United Community Housing Coalition, a partnership between Cinnaire and CHN Housing Partners, Data Driven Detroit, Elevate Energy and Community Investment Corp. Enterprise Community Partners will lead the team and create action plans for preserving units."
Detroit News / March 9, 2020
"The City of Detroit has formed a partnership with six organizations to preserve affordable housing in the city, improve housing stock and prevent displacement."
DS News / March 3, 2020
"“This year we set out to increase the number of Detroit families assisted through HPTAP, and I am proud of our work in collaboration with Quicken Loans Community Fund, United Community Housing Coalition, and community groups to meet this goal,” said Detroit Chief Financial Officer David Massaron with the announcement of the HPTAP program expansion."
FOX 2 Detroit / February 28, 2020
"I put my faith in United Housing Coalition and it worked, I would recommend anybody for this program that's losing their homes who think they have to leave, they don't. They can help you," Kennedy said.
National Mortgage Professional Magazine / February 28, 2020
"The Quicken Loans Community Fund, City of Detroit and United Community Housing Coalition (UCHC) announced that 557 properties entered into Detroit’s Make It Home program during 2019, bringing the program’s total to 1,157 families were able to avoid tax-foreclosure related displacement. The Make It Home program launched in 2017."
The Detroit News / February 27, 2020
“Who better to buy it but the person who already lives there,” said Michele Oberholtzer, director of Tax Foreclosure Prevention with the United Community Housing Coalition. “Every neighborhood in Detroit is made stronger because of this program.”
WDET / January 24, 2020
