Nearly 1,000 blighted N.O. lots expected to be auctioned off, sold

The New Orleans Redevelopment Authority is hoping to unload nearly 1,000 blighted properties in upcoming months, with 137 slated for the auction block on Oct. 27, and 700 to 800 more expected to be sold to neighbors if the City Council agrees to relax the rules of a program allowing New Orleans residents to buy blighted properties they live next to, The Times-Picayune reports. The auction, set for 1 p.m. at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center on Oct. 27, will include 40 buildings in various states of disrepair and 97 empty lots. Both live and online bidding will be available. It will be the first blighted property auction since January, with the events intentionally staggered to avoid flooding the housing market with cheap properties, according to Valerie Robinson, a spokeswoman for the agency. The 137 properties to be auctioned are among the most desirable of the 3,420 that remain on NORA’s books. Officials estimate that only 150 additional properties are in reasonable shape to be auctioned. The agency controls only a fraction of the more than 50,000 blighted properties in the city of New Orleans. A listing of the properties to be bid on at the Oct. 27 auction should be available later this week and can be found at Noraworks.org. They will likely range in value from a couple thousand dollars to more than $100,000, Robinson says. Read the full story here.