Abandoned homes need maintenance too

Florida foreclosures are causing may home owners to abandon their properties, leaving them to rot. Mortgage companies are hiring contractors to maintain the vacant homes — some with peeling paint, gutted interiors, family dogs left behind to starve and overgrown lawns infested with snakes — before the houses fall victim to inclement weather or vandals. Local and state governments have started fining mortgage companies that do not maintain the homes that they repossess.