Overgrown bushes, boarded windows, flooded basements.
Mike Foley, Framingham Building Inspector "Watch your step."
Piles of trash, discarded possessions, broken glass.
Hank Phillippi Ryan, Investigative Reporter "This is a mess!"
Who owns these rundown places? Mortgage lenders and banks. Multimillion dollar institutions who foreclosed on these homes in the affluent suburbs and then abandoned them.
We found this is one of several in Plymouth, where town officials are shocked at the conditions.
Hank Phillippi Ryan, Investigative Reporter "Would you like to live next door to this?"
Susan Merrifield, Plymouth Health Director "No, of course not."
Neighbors are enraged.
James Cimon, Plymouth Resident "It looked like something I've never seen in the neighborhood. There's tires in the yard, trash."
Our investigation finds the mortgage mess is slamming the suburbs. Lenders turned landlords turn their backs on these empty houses leaving them deteriorating and hazardous. This mountain of trash was in this front yard for months. The swimming pool was a murky dangerous swamp of black water. And here's the back of the house.
Hank Phillippi Ryan, Investigative Reporter "Someone clearly isn't taking care of this."
Plymouth's health director says she battled for months even to find the lender.
Hank Phillippi Ryan, Investigative Reporter "Do they come to you and say we're in charge of this place now, we'll take care of it?"
Susan Merrifield, Plymouth Health Director "No."
We found these foreclosed homes in Marlborough, in Plymouth, in Framingham. Decrepit, rotting, overgrown, and ignored by the lenders who now own them.
On this charming street in Wakefield this homeowner cannot believe the view next door.
Christopher Clare, Wakefield resident "It needs a new roof, it needs to be painted, the windows are in bad shape. "
Who's supposed to clean this up? Or this? Or this? It's difficult to find out. We found most communities have no reporting system that require lenders who take over foreclosed homes to notify local officials.
Pam Wilderman, Marlborough Code Enforcement "Finding who actually owns the property and who is going to accept responsibility for its upkeep is almost a full time job."
In Framingham the building inspector keeps this database of the towns foreclosure hot spots, but he only knows about them when someone complains.
Mike Foley, Framingham Building Inspector "They don't call us, you know they don't return our calls. "
Of the 247 properties on his list he says many are neglected, but the lenders aren't interested and look what they leave behind.
Hank Phillippi Ryan, Investigative Reporter "What's the result to the neighborhood?"
Mike Foley, Framingham Building Inspector "The neighborhood is upset."
Lenders blame homeowners neglect, long distance banking, and the sheer number of foreclosures.
Kevin Cuff, Massachusetts Mortgage Banker's Association "And they've come at a fast and furious clip, it's been extremely difficult for them to keep up with it."
Hank Phillippi Ryan, Investigative Reporter "So are they overwhelmed?"
Kevin Cuff, Massachusetts Mortgage Banker's Association "Oh, absolutely."
How many foreclosed properties across the state are like this? Right now no one knows. And town officials worry as long as lenders dodge their responsibilities–it's only going to get worse.
Hank Phillippi Ryan, Investigative Reporter To try to change this, the state's division of banks now has a brand new system. It requires lenders to report what homes they've foreclosed on and exactly who's in charge of maintaining them. In the newsroom, I'm Hank Phillippi Ryan.
(Copyright (c) 2008 Sunbeam Television Corp. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)