Buffalo ranks near the top of U.S. cities vacant houses
Only two American cities, Detroit and New Orleans, have a higher percentage of vacant houses than Buffalo.
Yes, we all know of at least one horror story about the city's vacant houses, but few of us are aware of the magnitude of the problem.
Did you know, for example, that City Hall is now Buffalo's biggest landowner, and there are streets on the East Side where the city owns more than half of the properties are vacant or abandoned?
Did you also know that a third of all city streets have at least one vacant and abandoned property?
And did you know that new data indicates the city's vacant housing crisis is spreading to Black-Riverside and Buffalo's first-ring suburbs.
It's a problem of immense proportions and, in the words of Kathryn Foster, director of the University at Buffalo's Regional Institute, may pose the single biggest challenge to Buffalo's neighborhoods.
Have you, as a homeowner, renter, neighbor or investor, experienced the consequences of Buffalo's vacant housing?
- Phil Fairbanks
