Monday, July 28, 2008

Largest Extreme Home Makeover Lost to Foreclosure

I just read this story and it is so frustrating. So many people gave so much to make a difference in these peoples lives only to have them misuse and then lose all that was given to them. How very sad.

Three years after more than 1,800 people showed up to help ABC's Extreme Makeover team demolish and replace a familiy's decrepit home and make it into a gorgeous mini mansion in Lake City, Georgia the family has lost it to forclosure.

The Harper family used the two-story home as collateral for a $450,000 and it's set to go to auction on the steps of the Clayton County Courthouse Aug. 5. The couple did not return phone calls Monday, but told a TV reporter they received the loan for a construction business that failed.

The house was built in 2005, after Atlanta-based Beazer Homes USA and ABC’s “Extreme Makeover” demolished their old home and its faulty septic system. Within six days, construction crews and hoards of volunteers had completed work on the largest home that the program had built.

The finished product was a four-bedroom house with decorative rock walls and a three-car garage that towered over ranch and split-level homes in their neighborhood. The home’s door opened into a lobby that featured four fireplaces, a solarium, a music room and a plush new office.

Materials and labor were donated for the home, which would have cost about $450,000 to build. Beazer Homes’ employees and company partners also raised $250,000 in contributions for the family, including scholarships for the couple’s three children and a home maintenance fund.

In a statement, ABC said it advises each family to consult a financial planner after they get their new home.

Some of the volunteers who helped build the home were less than thrilled about the family’s financial decisions.“It’s aggravating. It just makes you mad. You do that much work, and they just squander it,” Lake City Mayor Willie Oswalt, who helped vault a massive beam into place in the Harper’s living room, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

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