Nationstar Mortgage will provide up to $30 million to financially troubled Milwaukee homeowners under an agreement to be announced by city officials Friday.
The announcement comes after months of negotiations and as public hearings are set to begin next week on the city’s role in financing the proposed $500 million Milwaukee Bucks arena.
And although Mayor Tom Barrett and Common Council President Michael Murphy said Thursday that the agreement with Nationstar will stand regardless of city’s decision on the arena plan, the two are clearly related.
Wes Edens, a co-owner of the Bucks, is the co-founder, principal and co-chairman of Fortress Investment Group. Fortress acquired Nationstar in 2006 and took the company public in March 2012.
Edens also is on the board of directors of Nationstar, a residential mortgage servicer overseeing 3,400 properties in Milwaukee.
Under the agreement, Nationstar will:
- Provide up to $30 million over the next three years. That’s a 57 percent increase in the mortgage company’s anticipated investment.
“That 57 percent increase will help toward keeping people in their homes,” Murphy said. - Contribute $500,000 over next three years to the city’s popular home improvement loan program.
The program enables homeowners who are financially underwater to borrow money to make critical home repairs. - Hold face-to-face meetings with customers three times a year for the next three years.
“That’s what we live by,” Nationstar spokesman John Hoffmann said. “Our business is to help homeowners.
“There is no joy in foreclosure. There is no joy in financial distress.” - Donate property to community organizations along with $10,000 per property for rehabilitation.
Nationstar owns 17 properties in the city, Hoffmann said. - Ensure homes that are under its control and are in the foreclosure process comply with city foreclosure ordinances.
There are about 150 Milwaukee homes in foreclosure with mortgages serviced by Nationstar, Hoffmann said. Forty-six of them are vacant and could become neighborhood nuisances.
Nationstar Chief Executive Officer Jay Bray will continue to meet with Milwaukee leaders and help the city negotiate housing issues at the federal level.
Common Ground, a community organization that has vocally opposed the city entering into a deal with the Bucks without investment by Nationstar in Milwaukee neighborhoods, did not participate in negotiations.
But the group “played a positive role,” Barrett said.
“They made a significant impact in moving the ball,” he said.
That role has at time been contentious.
Common Ground, which has also met with Bray, has called the Bucks’ owners “billionaire bullies” who neither need nor deserve public money to build an arena.
Common Ground’s lead organizer, Keisha Krumm, said group members planned to meet early Friday to decide if they would join city and Nationstar officials in announcing the deal.
“Common Ground is pleased that the mayor and Common Council President Michael Murphy negotiated aggressively in our behalf to get the best deal they could get for our city,” she said.
“We are pleased with the result.”
