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84 MICHIGAN Genessee County Homeowners Could Catch Break Underwater homeowners in Michigan are in luck—at least the ones in Genessee County. Until March 31, the Genesee County Treasurer's Office is offering a one-year postponement to some local residents facing foreclosure. According to the application, the programs is designed for homeowners going through "substantial financial hardship," including reductions or losses of income, increased expenses, divorce, and more. To be eligible for the one-year, hardship postponement, homeowners must be facing a foreclosure for 2014 or earlier, or be delinquent on property taxes for the same year. ey also must currently own and reside in the home and have a Principal Residential Exemption (formerly known as the Homestead Exemp- tion.) e deadline for qualification is March 31. Anyone who applies and is not granted a postponement will face foreclosure at the end of business that day. Michigan also offers the Step Forward Michigan Program, a federally funded pro- gram which, through a partnership with the Michigan Homeowner Assistance Nonprofit Housing Corporation and the Michigan State Housing Development Authority, offers assistance to homeowners who are delinquent on their mortgage, property taxes, or condo- minium fees. e program offers 0 percent interest Hardest Hit Fund loans to help qualify- ing homeowners pay off these debts. To be eligible, residents must: own and live in their own home; have a lender, county treasurer, or condo association who is a participating partner in the program; have less than $10,000 in the bank; have enough income to pay future housing expenses; and have experienced a qualifying event, such as a death, unemploy- ment, or divorce that caused the delinquency. MISSOURI St. Louis Fed: Foreclosure Crisis Nears Conclusion After Nearly a Decade e U.S. mortgage crisis is drawing to a close. at, at least, is the assessment of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, which stated recently that the final remnants of the recession's "historically elevated rates of extreme mortgage distress and defaults" are largely in the rearview mirror and that the foreclosure crisis should officially end early this year. Several industry reports over the end of 2016 bear out the bank's statements. In Janu- ary, ATTOM Data Solutions reported that foreclosures have hit a 10-year low nationally, and that even those foreclosures still on the books are mainly remnants of originations from a decade ago. "e end is near," the bank wrote in its look at Eighth District states (the bank's region). "e condition of current mortgage borrowers considered as a group—nationwide or state by state—is once again comparable to the period just before the Great Recession and the onset of the foreclosure crisis." e bank targets the last quarter of 2007 as the beginning of the crisis. By the end of 2016, "As many as 10 million mortgage borrowers may have lost their homes," the bank stated. But by the end of 2016, several states had al- ready exited their respective foreclosure crises, including Missouri and Tennessee. According to the bank, Arkansas and Illinois are primed to do so soon. A few states—namely Indiana, Kentucky, and Mississippi—however, experienced much longer crises than a decade and have held onto higher rates of foreclosed properties. ese states, the bank said, saw their foreclosure troubles start as early as 2001. Nevertheless, the bank wrote, foreclosure issues in Eighth District states, many of which were plagued by abnormally high foreclosure numbers during the recession, are nearing the accepted national benchmark of 2.81 percent of homes in foreclosure. Citing data from the Mortgage Bankers Association, the bank reported that foreclosure rates in all Eighth District states have been in sharp and steady freefall since 2013. According to the bank, the national fore- closure rate at the end of 2016 was 3.2 percent, which should return to 2.81 percent this quarter. All remaining Eighth District states should be out of their crises by the end of 2017, except for Mississippi, which, still contend- ing with a 4.27 percent foreclosure rate, is expected to close out its crisis by mid 2018. NORTH DAKOTA Want Family- Friendly? Move to North Dakota inking of starting a family? You may want to head up to North Dakota. According to a recent study from Wal- letHub, North Dakota is the most family- friendly state in the nation. It ranked high in many of the study's 40 categories, including health and safety, socioeconomic, affordabil- ity, family fun, and education. Its highest rankings were in the socio- economic category, which considers rates of separations, divorces, poverty numbers, food assistance participation, family leave policies, wealth gaps, job security, the labor market, and unemployment stats. According to WalletHub Analyst Jill Gonzalez, "North Dakota shines from a socioeconomic standpoint, with the second- lowed divorce rate at just 16 percent, the second-lowest percentage of families receiving food stamps at less than 8 percent, and the lowest unemployment rate at just 2.7 percent." is means a place where families can live and prosper for many years to come, according to Sandy McMerty, Co-Deputy Commis- sioner at the North Dakota Department of Commerce. "We have one of the lowest unemployment rates in the country, with jobs available in a wide range of fields, from energy to manufac- turing, health care, education, administration, and much more," McMerty said. "We are building an environment where people can live larger and businesses can grow faster." Gonzalez said the state has a consider- ably high median family income at just over $75,000, and both jobs and wages have in- creased steadily since 2010, with nearly 80,000 more jobs and an average wage increase of $12,569. "In terms of day-to-day affordability, North Dakota ranked third best for housing affordability, mostly because the state has a high (adjusted) median annual family income at $75,159," Gonzalez said. "It's also important Detroit had the largest year-over- year increase in the amount of homes that were flipped relative to the total number of homes sold, according to SmartAsset's Top 10 Healthiest Housing Markets ranking. KNOW THIS

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