Lot vacancy and property abandonment: colonias and informal subdivisions in Texas

Abstract

Property abandonment and lot vacancy are issues of growing importance given widespread demographic and economic changes in urban areas in the USA. This paper explores these issues in a different context, that of colonias and Informal Homestead Subdivisions in Texas. Housing and infrastructure conditions in these very low-income settlements are invariably poor. Given that the majority of these subdivisions are unincorporated, they face a variety of barriers to coordinated land and housing development that would combat high rates of lot vacancy and property abandonment. This paper documents changes in lot vacancy in these subdivisions from baseline 2002 to 2012, and analyses county tax assessor records to determine the extent to which property tax delinquency is a corollary of abandonment and long-term lot vacancy. The causes of lot and housing abandonment are discussed. Policy interventions such as Land Banking and Community Land Trusts are proposed as mechanisms to bring vacant lots back onto the market and prevent property abandonment by homeowners in unincorporated informal subdivisions.

Keywords:

• lot vacancy
• property abandonment
• colonias
• land banking
• community land trusts

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. For copies of the report (Ward, Way, & Wood, 2012), methodology, and the full (redacted) database, see http://www.lahn.utexas.org/Texas%20Colonias/TDHCA.html

2. For copies of the report (Ward et al., 2012), methodology, and database, see http://www.lahn.utexas.org/Texas%20Colonias/TexasColonias4.html.

3. These estimates are similar to those acquired via satellite image analysis (discussed earlier), although they are not directly comparable because (1) the data refer to different settlements, and (2) abandoned or unoccupied homes are indistinguishable from occupied homes when using satellite image analysis, and thus the rate of vacancy as measured by the absence of a dwelling is closer to 16%.

4. Across all eight counties, there is statistically significant variation in the proportion of vacancies (Chi-square test statistic of 118, p-value of <.000).

5. Across the three counties for which detailed vacancy occupancy status was collected (Guadalupe, Hays, and Maverick), there was a statistically significant variation in the proportion of lots in each of the four categories (vacant, unfinished structure, abandoned structure, and unoccupied homes; Chi-square test statistic of 24, p-value of <.001).

6. A Chi-square test comparing the vacancy count in randomly selected colonias in six counties (Cameron, El Paso, Hidalgo, Maverick, Starr, and Webb) with those in Guadalupe and Hays Counties was marginally significant (Chi-square statistic of 3.4, p-value of .065).

7 Owners in these low-income colonias and informal subdivisions are liable to property taxes, albeit a relatively low and usually flat rate on vacant lots. Tax appraisals on the improvement value are often quite rough and are invariably quite modest.

8. We estimated logistic and ordinary least squares regressions predicting arrears status (in arrears = 1, not in arrears = 0) and the total amount owed, respectively, as a function of the occupancy status of the lot, the total property value, and whether a local address was given for the March tax liability data.

9. We are grateful to one of the anonymous reviewers for pointing out this possible explanation, not least since it concurs with one of our findings elsewhere (Durst & Ward, 2014) that tax rebates are frequently used to make home improvements.

10. The selection of the survey colonias in the six border counties was randomised to allow for extrapolation to colonias in each county – a condition of the grant from the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs. However, these data are for Cameron County only and cannot be extended to other counties, although our extensive observations suggest that these results are not out of line with housing vacancy and abandonment levels elsewhere.

11. While the latter issue is largely latent, the aging of long-term lot owners, combined with the very low proportion of colonia owners who have a will (less than 8%; see Ward, Way, & Wood 2015), means that inheritance conflicts are likely to rise and, if not resolved, are likely to accentuate tax delinquency as well as an increase in the trend of abandonment.

12. Elsewhere we document how approximately 30,000 lots have been developed since 1990 in model subdivisions across seven counties (Durst, in press). Assuming that inflation-adjusted costs for land and infrastructure development (for water, waste water, electricity, and paved streets) are $5,000 per lot – a conservative estimate, for sure – developers have spent at least a $150 million. Much of this cost has been passed along to buyers.

13. In 2003, Texas passed HB 2801 allowing for the establishment of a land bank by the City of Dallas. To our knowledge, no other governmental entities are currently authorised to operate a land bank in Texas.