Lake Elsinore, Perris and several other cities and nonprofit agencies will have access to more than $16 million in neighborhood revitalization funds under a plan approved by Riverside County supervisors on Tuesday.

County supervisors authorized the release of federal Neighborhood Stabilization Program (NSP) funds to the cities of Lake Elsinore, Norco and Desert Hot Springs, as well as the county’s Housing Authority, the Riverside Housing Development Corp., Coachella Valley Housing Coalition and Neighborhood Partnership Housing Services Inc.

Earlier this year, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development disbursed roughly $50 million in NSP community block grant funds to the county to use to help ailing local housing markets.

The taxpayer dollars come from the $3.9 billion Housing & Economic Recovery Act of 2008, a relief package passed by Congress and signed into law in July by then-President George Bush.

The Riverside County Economic Development Agency (EDA) is handling disbursal of the county’s share of the funds.

Under the EDA plan, $20 million is set aside for the acquisition and rehabilitation of vacant, foreclosed and abandoned single-family dwellings, which must be resold to low- and moderate-income residents.

Lake Elsinore will receive $2.8 million to purchase 15 vacant properties, costing $79,900 to $229,900 apiece. Rehabilitation costs should range between $25,000 and $65,000 per property, according to the city.

Neighborhood Partnership Housing Services Inc., an Ontario-based nonprofit that specializes in neighborhood revitalization, is slated to receive $1.37 million to purchase six bank-owned properties in Perris, with prices ranging between $108,375 and $171,190.

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will range between $30,000 and $71,000 per property, according to the organization.

The county Housing Authority will receive $3 million to purchase a dozen vacant properties, priced between $129,000 and $243,000, in unincorporated areas near Canyon Lake, French Valley, Lake Elsinore, Murrieta and San Jacinto as well as the Rubidoux, Beaumont, Eastvale and Home Gardens areas.

Rehabilitation costs are expected to range between $3,800 and $63,942 per property.

Last year, roughly seven percent of Riverside County households were in default or at high risk of going into default, according to EDA officials.

In its May foreclosure market report, Irvine-based RealtyTrac said Riverside County has the third-highest foreclosure volume in California, with one in 70 households more than 90 days overdue on mortgage payments or on the auction block.

After the homes are fixed up, they will be sold to residents in the low- and medium-income brackets, according to agency officials. No qualifying homebuyer can have owned a property in the last three years, nor earn more than 120 percent of the county’s median income, which for a family of four would be around $79,000.

There is also a requirement that buyers attend classes on how to be responsible homeowners.

The county will resell the properties at an average 15-percent discount to fair market value and will offer down-payment assistance and a deferred second loan, in addition to the primary loan obtained through an EDA-approved mortgage lender.

More information on the county’s first-time homebuyer program is available at www.rivcoeda.org.

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