As cars whizzed down Emerson Street, a home stood silent and empty under a dreary cluster of clouds that threatened to pour down on Haverhill.
A bright yellow sign affixed to the front window announced to passersby that the multi-family home is headed to auction. Trash collected in the weedy, overgrown front yard.
The house at 115 Emerson St. is just one of the most recent casualties as the foreclosure crisis clamps down on urban areas throughout the country.
Just a block away, Emmaus, Inc., a nonprofit that helps Haverhill's homeless, is trying to keep up with the increasing number of tenants forced to leave their dwellings due to foreclosures, while the number of affordable units available to them decreases.
"For us, it means that more families are looking for places to go to," explained Jeanine Murphy, executive director of Emmaus, "and for families already in our shelter who are looking for housing, that rental stock is out of circulation. These units are sitting vacant and no one can use them."
According to data from Banker & Tradesman, a banking, real estate and commercial weekly in Massachusetts and a publication of the Warren Group, Haverhill had 54 foreclosures in 2006, then 133 in 2007 — a 146.3 percent increase. That increase is a bit worse than the state. In Massachusetts 2,886 homes were foreclosed on in 2006, but in 2007 that number soared to 7,056 for an increase of 144.5 percent.
The housing hardest hit is multi-family dwellings in urban areas, according to the Warren Group, an area that accurately describes Haverhill's downtown.
At Emmaus they are seeing the families they have helped get on their feet move into new apartments, being kicked out when their landlords are foreclosed on.
"Inner cities are in crisis, and that's where our clients are usually renting apartments," Murphy said.
Murphy worries that the foreclosed homes that lay empty will become magnets for unsavory activity and their unkempt exteriors will drag down everything else around them.
"Property that is abandoned is not good for a community," Murphy said. "It can lead to deterioration of neighborhoods."
For Murphy and her colleagues at Emmaus, who try to maintain their mission of helping homeless people re-enter the community, the hardest part of the foreclosure crisis is the fact that it didn't have to happen.
"It's really a tragedy, and it could have been easily avoided," Murphy said. "These mortgage companies knew they (mortgage holders) wouldn't be able to afford it."
Murphy said most of the companies that approved the mortgages are from out of state. They didn't mind offering mortgages well beyond the value of a home or well beyond what people could afford because they made money. And because they're not local, they have no interest in what happens to the people of Haverhill.
"They have no links to any of our communities," Murphy said. "You can't call them up and ask for some assistance. It's not someone you can talk to."
The mortgage crisis is exacerbated by the high cost of other essentials, like food, heating oil and gasoline, creating a financial strain that is too much for low and middle income families to bear.
"Maybe if it was just the mortgage, more people could afford it," Murphy said. "But add to that the fact that the cost of food has tripled and the cost of fuel has tripled, people just can't handle it. I know people we serve are really trying to get back into the community, and they have to make some difficult choices. It's tough times, especially for the poorest of the poor. They're holding on by a thread, and someone is cutting that thread."
But through it all, Murphy is confident that the kindness and compassion of local residents will keep Emmaus running smoothly so they can help as many community members as possible.
"I believe people will continue to think of people less fortunate than them," Murphy said. "Most people are inherently good."
