The hard economy keeps hitting too close to home for some Montanans. More than 250 homes in the state are in foreclosure.
Brokers tell us that's average for this recession. We went to a foreclosure sale at the Flathead County Courthouse, but no one showed up to do the sale. It's like an auction... only it's called a trustee sale. It's one way mortgage companies get rid of the property and recover some of the money. But, we found out today, those sales often don't happen.
Broker Gordon Zuehlsdorff says, "A lot of the sales are cancelled or don't happen because the house is sold or property owners are able to make payments or there was a mistake in the notice and they aren't required to notify anybody that its been cancelled. They just don't show up."
We met one of the homeowners who thought her house would be sold today.
Home owner Sharon Nash says, "I am sitting in my home for maybe the last few days. I am in the process of having my house foreclosed on."
Nash doesn't know where she'll be living in a few weeks.
Nash says, "you're completely scared, you're nervous, you're insecure... You're trying the best you can to pull everything together and make it work, but the bottom line is if you have payments you cant make... You can't make them"
Foreclosure was a foreign word to Nash, something that only happened to other people. But now, Nash's house will join almost 50 others in Flathead Valley that are in foreclosure.
Nash tells the News Channel, "the scariest part about being in foreclosure is what's next... Especially if you don't have an income."
Back in 2006, when Nash and her husband bought this house they never imagined they would lose it. After all, that's what happened to the previous owners.
But, just 9 days shy of their 25th anniversary, Nash and her husband divorced. Nash was a homemaker. So, she had to jump start her own career. SHe didn't have steady work and couldn't keep up with the bills.
Nash says, "this will be a house that I will miss... I have a passion and love for history so every room that I see, I will look around and think I love everything about this house. It would be easier for me to loose a house in foreclosure if you didn't like it in the first place or you didn't like your neighbors or something... But I love everything about it."
After spedning months putting sweat, money, and time into this house, and spedning two years enjoying her hard work... Nash says she has to remember a house is just some pieves of wood.
Nash says, "the past few years I would definitely say I have been traveling through hell itself but I would remind people... You might be going through a rough time but you don't have to live there. The thing is, every morning we start off at square A."
So tomorrow, Nash says she will start all over at square "a," with a positive attitude to get through these tough times.
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