Artists Help Clear Up Foreclosure Listings in Cities
April 22nd, 2009 by 
Joseph Smith
Artists have always been known for occupying blighted neighborhoods, gentrifying them and spurring commercial and residential development.
Now that thousands of houses are being abandoned to list of foreclosure homes, artists are now again rejuvenating neighborhoods battered by foreclosures.
In Cleveland, where the population has declined to only about 430,000 from the peak of almost one million in 1950 due to the collapse of manufacturing companies, artists are taking advantage of cheap rents, bargain-priced homes, large spaces and lots of choices in foreclosure listings.
In March, artists Sunia Boneham and Michael Di Liberto moved from New York to Cleveland, into a three-bedroom home in the Collinwood community, where more than 200 homes are unoccupied and included in foreclosure listings.
The couple said their home is one of several houses acquired by a community development nonprofit from foreclosure listings. The nonprofit plans to turn the neighborhood into an artist village in Collinwood.
Similarly, in other cities, artists are also buying homes from foreclosure listings. In Detroit, architects and artists are purchasing houses for as low as $100. In Hamilton, Ohio, an abandoned property has been acquired by the nonprofit development group Artspace Projects for a planned artist community. In Saint Louis, artists are turning empty store spaces in malls into artist studios for as low as $100 a month.
In Cleveland, where about 15,000 homes are vacant and waiting for buyers in growing foreclosure listings, artists have been spearheading neighborhood rehabilitation. A local painter, Katherine Chilcote, bought a house for only $5,000 and later bought an adjoining empty lot for just $500. Her plan is to buy four more abandoned houses from foreclosure listings and convert them into artist studios and residences.
The city of Cleveland has also allocated $500,000 to finance efforts by citizens to turn abandoned properties in foreclosure listings into facilities for artists and the promotion of the arts.
In September, the Community Partnership for Arts and Culture of Cleveland will hold another conference of artists, city officials, civic leaders, real estate agents and local bankers to discuss strategies in transforming Cleveland into the arts center of the region.
To respond to claims that artists are transforming formerly affordable neighborhoods into unaffordable enclaves of the financially endowed, artists are now putting more efforts into buying their own homes rather than renting. Cities like Cleveland are providing financing schemes to artists in exchange for their help in preventing blight caused by growing foreclosure listings.
