The Village of Milford recently bought 37 residential properties thanks to unpaid taxes. Council members of the Village agreed to the surprise move at a meeting on 5th November, following Oakland County’s failure to auction them off three months ago in August and again last month.
“This is the first time I have seen this happen in the 25 years I have been here,” says village finance director/treasurer Becky Jacques. “We will attempt to sell the parcels, but since this is our first experience with the [Oakland Country foreclosure] process, I’m not sure how we will proceed from here.”
All except one of the properties are situated in Uptown Village, which is an unfinished townhouse development located just north of downtown. The Uptown Village’s Homeowner’s Association treasurer, Andrea Mellen, says that the vacant properties situated at Uptown Village passed through a number of different hands before they entered foreclosure. Tadian Homes was the original owner of Uptown Village, which was then bought out by a bigger construction company, Neumann Homes, in January 2005. That company went bankrupt during 2007’s housing crisis and Uptown Village’s unfinished properties went with it.
The lack of financing forced Jacobson Milford LLC, the current developer, to hand it over to the Village, which has been attempting to sell them and get people to move in ever since.
“We still want to keep our neighborhood feel,” says local resident Stacy Wegner. “It’s kind of a quiet area.”
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