Source: Chicago Tribune

Torrey Warship had never owned a home — until the mortgage foreclosure crisis.

Through a federal program to renovate foreclosed homes, the 34-year-old public works laborer bought his first house in Waukegan for $138,000. He moved his family out of an apartment and into a two-story, two-bedroom, 2 1/2-bath home in a “nice and peaceful neighborhood.”

“I’m loving it,” he said. “If it wasn’t for that (program), I wouldn’t have been able to get it.”

Warship is one of a small number of new homeowners benefiting from the Neighborhood Stabilization Program, which has sent $4.6 million to Lake County to buy, renovate and sell foreclosed, abandoned homes.  Read more…