This morning, we added Foreclosure is Not an Option to our Resources Section.

ESOP, which stands for Empowering and Strengthening Ohio’s People, is a nonprofit that helps homeowners renegotiate the terms of their mortgages so that they can stay in their homes.  Since its inception in 2005, the program reports that it has saved 13,000 homes from foreclosure.  It should be expanded to other states.

Many of of  our Over 50 and Out of Work interviewees have already lost their homes or are currently facing foreclosure.  They feel stonewalled by their mortgage lenders and find themselves unable to renegotiate the terms of their loans to save their homes.

“I am in the midst of fighting to keep my house,” one of our project interviewees, who remains unemployed, emailed recently.  “Citimortgage has filed foreclosure papers.  They don’t want to work with anyone.”