HOME CLINIC
Introduction
The real estate market in the San Diego region has experienced high housing appreciation in recent years, but housing prices have cooled. Risky loans, lax underwriting standards, loan products that limit the amount of equity a borrower builds, and predatory lending practices have created difficulties for homeowners. Many homeowners are facing foreclosure or ballooning monthly payments they know they cannot afford. Frightened homeowners need resources to stave off foreclosure, eviction and family chaos. Many of them are victims of deceptive business practices.
HOME CLINIC ( Home Owners Mobile Education)
The Home Clinic is a project provided by Housing Opportunities Collaborative (HOC), a coalition of nonprofit organizations and agencies in the San Diego region.
The Home Clinic is a portal which enables the distressed homeowner access to existing resources and services. HOC’s Home Clinic pools attorneys, real estate and mortgage industry professionals, housing counseling agencies, fair housing agencies, and other public agencies into one location to give a one-stop shop of counseling resources. It aims to connect distressed homeowners to legal assistance, consumer protection assistance, credit counseling, fair housing counseling, and agencies that can help their plight. Local attorneys who have real estate, lending and mortgage industry experience will give services. Staff members of local HUD approved housing counseling and credit counseling agencies will also be available. Distressed homeowners will get personal review of their mortgage/lending/escrow documents and will be referred to local HUD approved housing counseling agencies or to local law enforcement or to local attorneys for resolution. The attorneys are affiliated with the local Legal Aid Society pro bono program and with the members of the Ethnic Relations Diversity Committee of the San Diego County Bar Association.
SERVICES TO BE PROVIDED (All participants have agreed not to solicit business)
EDUCATIONAL SESSIONS: Short sessions on consumer credit management, bankruptcy, foreclosure, and consumer protection
HOUSING COUNSELING BY: HUD approved housing counseling agencies
LEGAL COUNSELING BY: Real Estate attorneys, Landlord/Tenant attorneys and Bankruptcy/Tax attorneys
REVIEW OF REAL ESTATE AND LENDING DOCUMENTS BY: Mortgage counselors monitored by the National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals
CLIENT Intake and Exit: Volunteers review client needs, guide them to the attorneys, brokers and housing and credit counselors and conduct exit interview. Follow-up phone calls and appointments will be made for those families who cannot be seen by a counselor that day.
GIVE-AWAYS: All families will receive, while supplies last, a goody bag filled with snacks, water bottle, and numerous sheets of housing resources. These resources include complaint forms from the Department of Real Estate & Department of Corporations, a sheet listing the Unlawful Detainer Clinics presented by the Legal Aid Society of San Diego, and other homeownership preservation information.
The HOME CLINIC IS community service project of the Housing Opportunities Collaborative in collaboration with the Legal Aid Society of San Diego Pro Bono Program. For more information about the HOME Clinic, contact Pamela Beard, Program Manager of HOC, at (619) 820-5198 or Myrna Pascual, San Diego HUD Field Office, at (619) 557-5305, ext. 228.
IF YOU ARE HOMEOWNER NEEDING IMMEDIATE ASSISTANCE, CALL THE NATIONAL HOPE HOTLINE AT 1-888-995-HOPE TO BE IMMEDIATELY CONNECTED WITH A HUD APPROVED HOUSING COUNSELING AGENCY REPRESENTATIVE.
