The Mortgage Meltdown: A look at Atlanta’s Foreclosure Crisis 
In some parts of metro Atlanta the number of foreclosures has more than doubled in the last year—a trend that experts predict will only get worse. We begin a series of reports and interviews on Atlanta’s mortgage crisis where many of those lost properties have ended up—the auction block on the courthouse steps.
On the first Tuesday of every month, outside courthouses in all 159 Georgia counties foreclosed properties go up for bid. It’s a quaint, even old-fashioned ritual—as we discovered the first Tuesday of this month at the DeKalb County courthouse in Decatur.
That reading of a list of properties to be disposed of was several pages in length..and comprised just one law firm’s agenda for the day. Gradually, representatives from several firms handling property for auction take their positions on and around the steps. Andrea Arteburn, a so-called “crier” for the law firm Shapiro and Swertfeger describes her role.
Interested buyers will gather close to the crier..and submit their bids; often in a quiet, detached manner—a far cry from the animated bidding process that might characterize other types of auctions.
Bill Mixon has been an interested investor since the early 90s. Watching today’s scenes from the sidelines he shares an observation.
Mixon says the crowds of bidders are smaller now than they were then; the deals are different. Within an hour the number of criers has increased to a dozen—each reading their property descriptives simultaneously.
All auctioned properties begin with the Lender’s bid, and prices rise from there (from that point). With the recent foreclosure crisis however, many of the properties return to the Lender. One bidder—a slender woman in her 60s with styled blonde hair who declined to give her name—estimates as many as 90 of the properties go unsold. She says it’s because so many mortgages are upside down.
So, how did this pattern of increasing foreclosures evolve? What were the causes? Who are the participants? The winners? The losers? And, what are the solutions? We’ll be asking these questions over the next 4 days as we talk with experts, agents, investors, lenders and those trying to help homeowners from losing their property.
