Stalled subdivisions leave homeowners on barren blocks home alone

TAYLOR — It would be easy for Christopher Lightfoot to erase the eyesore.

The carpenter figures parking his Ford E150 van on the front lawn would obscure the abandoned condominium complex across Beech Daly, the one with waterproof-wrap rippling in the wind and a half-finished fieldstone chimney.

But it wouldn’t fix the problem. Stalled subdivisions are becoming an increasing part of the landscape across Metro Detroit amid a slumping housing market for single-family homes and condominiums, threatening increases in property values and quality of life for neighbors.

As builders such as Neumann Homes auction new houses and struggle with plots that aren’t selling, residents are coping with empty lots and blight. They cope too with envy, as neighboring homes built after the housing-market bubble burst are selling for much less.

“It’s probably been the worst year I’ve ever seen in my life,” said Anthony Sorrentino of Clinton Township-based Sorrentino Development. “It’s like the whole world completely stopped.”

Detroit News