Regrid Press

Regrid™ launches daily delivery of Enhanced Ownership with their Nationwide Parcel Data

Cision PR Newswire

Regrid — a leading provider of nationwide land parcel data in the United States has launched their latest product of Enhanced Ownership as an add-on solution to their nationwide parcel data, providing the most current ownership information available with a daily delivery of recordings.

The Property Tax System is Broken—Regrid Works on Tools to Help Fix It

Strong Towns

The property tax system is broken all across the nation. In Detroit, residents face an issue of inconsistent assessments, where two homes that are similar in condition and sitting on similar-sized lots have widely different assessment scores.

Unpriced climate risk and the potential consequences of overvaluation in US housing markets

Nature Climate Change

Climate change impacts threaten the stability of the US housing market. In response to growing concerns that increasing costs of flooding are not fully captured in property values, we quantify the magnitude of unpriced flood risk in the housing market by comparing the empirical and economically efficient prices for properties at risk.

2023 Chicago aldermanic candidates answer Tribune questionnaire: Jocelyn Hare

Chicago Tribune

To inform voters and to help the Chicago Tribune Editorial Board make endorsements, the board posted a series of questions to the candidates running for alderman.

Union Twp. proposes annexation solution to Mapleton

The Daily News

Union Township and Mapleton Borough are exploring possible resolutions concerning 11 properties that were shifted out of the borough into the township four years ago.

Regrid™ launches a new version of their popular Regrid Property App

PR Newswire

Regrid — a leading provider of nationwide land parcel data in the United States have launched a new, refreshed version of their leading property app that allows anyone in the United States to look up properties, ownership, land use and much more in an easy to use mapping app - available on mobile and web.

Purpose Jobs Recognizes Regrid as Best Place to Work in 2023

PR Newswire

Purpose Jobs, the Midwest's largest startup and tech community, today announced Regrid to its list of best places to work in Midwest tech in 2023.

Purpose Jobs Recognizes Regrid as Best Place to Work in 2023

Yahoo Finance

Purpose Jobs, the Midwest's largest startup and tech community, today announced Regrid to its list of best places to work in Midwest tech in 2023.

Purpose Jobs Recognizes Regrid as Best Place to Work in 2023

AP News

Purpose Jobs, the Midwest's largest startup and tech community, today announced Regrid to its list of best places to work in Midwest tech in 2023.

The city of Cleveland and Western Reserve Land Conservancy announced on Friday that they will once again partner to survey and analyze nearly 170,000 land parcels in Cleveland, with the hopes that they will be able to identify properties in need of rehabilitation, lead abatement, code violations and demolition.

cleveland.com

Cleveland announces land parcel survey to identify and rehabilitate buildings with toxic lead

Regrid Launches Free Detroit Assessment Gauge to Evaluate Property Taxes

DBusiness Magazine

Regrid, a provider of national land parcel data based in Detroit, has released the Detroit Assessment Gauge to help homeowners determine if they may be paying too much in property taxes.

New tool can help Detroiters understand their home's assessment, offers information for appeal process

Detroit Free Press

A new tool can help Detroiters understand their home's assessment and offers a glimpse into how their property compares to those around them.

New tool shows who may be getting a deal on Detroit property taxes (and who's overpaying)

Crain's Detroit Business

A recent study of property assessments for single-family homes in Detroit showed landlords tend to benefit from inconsistent assessments more than homeowners...

Regrid Launches Detroit Assessment Gauge to Help Detroit Property Owners Evaluate Assessments and Property Taxes

PR Newswire

Regrid, a leading provider of national land parcel data with more than 154 million US property boundaries and underlying assessment data covering 99% of the US population, released today the Detroit Assessment Gauge, which can be found here: https://regrid.com/reports/detroit-assessment-gauge

More than 1 million US properties to be swallowed by the sea by 2100, report reveals

Interesting Engineering

It highlights the financial impact of climate change.

Rising Seas Are Going to Create a Huge Property Tax Headache for Coastal Communities

TIME

As properties disappear, so will the property taxes they generate. That lost revenue could impact school districts and municipal services.

Analysis: Rising seas threaten tax bases as private property falls below tidelines

Cision PR Newswire

New analysis from Climate Central quantifies the risk of sea level rise to the tax bases of hundreds of coastal counties across 24 states and Washington, D.C. as more land falls beneath the tideline.

How to research a Detroit landlord — and spot red flags before you sign a lease

Outlier Media

Having information about your rental home can prevent you from signing a bad lease and protect you from an eviction.

As the threat of tax foreclosure recedes, what comes next for Detroit homeowners?

Outlier Media

Many other issues still need to be addressed — including home repair and probate prevention...

Michigan’s new foreclosure claims law is pricing out housing programs

Crain's Detroit Business

The city of Oak Park typically uses its right of first refusal to take all homes that are foreclosed on in the city out of the foreclosure auction. This year, after intent to claim forms were filed on all three, city leaders determined they could only afford to buy two of them. The future of the program is now in doubt.

Stakes are high for Detroit renters living in foreclosed homes as auction nears

Detroit Free Press

About 1,000 non-owner-occupied homes in Detroit, including rental properties, went into tax foreclosure this year — a big uptick from right before the COVID-19 pandemic hit.

How Detroit homeowners may finally rid themselves of tax foreclosure

Outlier Media

Effective programs have greatly reduced tax delinquency — the true measure of housing stability.

At Invitation Homes, unpermitted work leaves leaky plumbing, faulty repairs, renters say

The Washington Post

One of the nation’s largest corporate landlords, the company rapidly bought and renovated thousands of properties, often without required permits.

Regrid™ Announces Esri-compatible Feature Service

PRNewswire

Regrid — a leading provider of nationwide land parcel data in the United States — today formally announces an Esri-compatible Feature Service that delivers their Nationwide Parcel Data straight into Esri environments for enterprises centered on Esri technologies.

Regrid™ Announces Esri-compatible Feature Service

AP news

Regrid — a leading provider of nationwide land parcel data in the United States — today formally announces an Esri-compatible Feature Service that delivers their Nationwide Parcel Data straight into Esri environments for enterprises centered on Esri technologies.

An Epidemic of Blight Collides With a Pandemic

Strong Towns

One of the most important streets in Detroit, to me, used to be the block of Hazelridge Street between Celestine and MacCrary.

Property owners have chance to profit from foreclosures in Michigan

Crain's Detroit

A summer 2020 state Supreme Court decision that allows people whose home are taken through tax foreclosure to claim the proceeds of their sales could see it first major implementation this year, following a year of muted foreclosure action.

Detroit program helps people living in foreclosed homes buy them for back taxes: 'It has been a blessing like no other'

Crain's Detroit

Howtoria Whitehead was living with her mother in 2018 when she saw a house for sale on Craigslist for $1,500.

Tax delinquency in Detroit is falling. Are new policies actually working?

Outlier Media

Why this property data researcher thinks tax foreclosure prevention programs have finally succeeded...

Detroit City Council wants Wayne Co. property tax moratorium extended through 2022

The Detroit News

The Detroit City Council unanimously approved a resolution Tuesday asking the Wayne County Treasurer's Office to extend the expiring moratorium on property tax foreclosures through the remainder of the year.

Opinion: Wayne County treasurer needs to act fast, stop 4,000+ tax foreclosures

Detroit Free Press

A disaster is headed for Wayne County, but Eric Sabree can stop it.

Giraffe Launches Site Search Powered by Regrid

Newswire

Giraffe, a cloud-based early stage planning platform for real estate development and urban planning, announced Site Search, a new app powered by a new partnership with Regrid.

Regrid™ Announce NPO Support Program, Data with Purpose

PR Newswire

Regrid — a leading provider of nationwide land parcel data in the United States — today formally announced their nonprofit organization (NPO) and academia support program, "Data with Purpose."

Global Top 100 Geospatial Companies – 2022 Edition

Geoawesomeness

Regrid included in 2022 edition of the best geospatial companies across the planet.

Regrid™ Launches Nationwide Land Parcel Data + Matched Secondary Addresses

PR Newswire

Regrid — a leading provider of nationwide land parcel data in the United States — today announced the launch of its new enhanced location certainty product

Top Detroit Startups and Tech Companies to Watch in 2022

Purpose Jobs

Michigan is now the state with the highest growth in VC investment. Now many Detroit startups are on the fast track to growth. Whether it’s new funding, expansions or IPOs, it’s been an eventful year in Detroit startups. Next year is looking even better. Here are the top Detroit startups and tech companies to watch in 2022.

The Tech That Slumlords Hate

Bloomberg CityLab

Housing activists, officials and researchers are deploying new tools to empower tenants, spotlight negligent property owners and curb evictions in U.S. cities.

Regrid™ launches Nationwide Land Parcel Data + Matched Building Footprints

PR Newswire

Regrid — a leading provider of nationwide land parcel data in the United States — announces the launch of their new enhanced location context product - Regrid Nationwide Parcel Data Premium Schema + Matched Building Footprints.

Regrid™ launches Nationwide Land Parcel Data + Matched Building Footprints

yahoo! finance

Regrid's new Parcels + Footprints product matches and pre-joins more than 156 million building footprint geometries to their nationwide parcel records (over 150 million parcels) and geometries, covering 99% of the American population.

Landgrid by Loveland Technologies is now Regrid

PRNewswire

Regrid — a leading provider of nationwide land parcel data in the United States — announces a rebrand from Landgrid by Loveland Technologies to...

Landgrid by Loveland Technologies is now Regrid

Yahoo Finance

Regrid — a leading provider of nationwide land parcel data in the United States — announces a rebrand from Landgrid by Loveland Technologies to Regrid as it continues to make land and location information more accessible, meaningful, and easier to work with. This is an identity consolidation and a company maturation move.

Landgrid by Loveland Technologies is now Regrid

AP News

Regrid — a leading provider of nationwide land parcel data in the United States — announces a rebrand from Landgrid by Loveland Technologies to Regrid as it continues to make land and location information more accessible, meaningful, and easier to work with. This is an identity consolidation and a company maturation move.

Loveland joins the Placekey launch

Placekey

Loveland Technologies is excited to be part of the Placekey Initiative! We've provided nationwide parcel data to back the service. Learn how Placekey will be instrumental in promoting data sharing across industries. Loveland CEO Jerry Paffendorf will introduce our role in a live session today.

Sahana Murthy on GeoHipster

GeoHipster

Landgrid GM Sahana Murthy was interviewed for GeoHipster by Mike Dolbow on topics ranging from our extensive coverage and complex cleaning and acquisition process to her vow to travel to every state in India.

TREC lays out roadmap to fight blight in Dallas

Dallas Business Journal

The plan was developed after an extensive data collection push that included documenting housing and demographic trends, public and private investment activity, and affordability.

Health Fund boosts WSU health initiative with $500,000 grant

Today@Wayne

The Michigan Health Endowment Fund awarded $500,000 to a major new health initiative at Wayne State University partnering with organizations including Loveland Technologies that has the potential to reshape how we think about health interventions in southeast Michigan.

Cleveland re-surveys east side neighborhoods to track change over time

Cleveland Plain Dealer

There’s no question that over the last three years, the combination of the city of Cleveland and the Cuyahoga Land Bank working together, and independently, have removed a lot of the most-distressed structures,” said Frank Ford. “So there definitely has been this movement to remove this blight that is undermining the housing market. To me, that suggests the housing market is becoming a healthier housing market on the East Side of Cleveland, and that is going to lead to less abandonment.

FBI scrutinizes Sabree property dealings; family underpaid taxes

Detroit News

"There has been a loss of trust for a long time," Paffendorf said. "There is not a consistent policy on why properties are foreclosed or not. ... I hope this is a gateway to a wider investigation that (the county isn't) following the law."

Talking Headways Podcast: Mapping the Land

Streetsblog

This week, we chat with Jerry Paffendorf, co-founder and CEO of Loveland Technologies, about how the company collects parcel data from all over the country, how parcels were measured historically, and how they can be used to create better transparency in cities.

Press Release: Loveland Technologies releases landgrid.com for nationwide land parcel data

Loveland Technologies

The way our America is subdivided, owned, taxed, and used is of critical importance to the health and development of our communities, yet this underlying land grid has largely remained inaccessible. Enter landgrid.com. Loveland Technologies — a property mapping and data company headquartered in Detroit, Michigan — has spent years gathering and organizing a nationwide dataset of 140 million land parcel shapes and records that cover 95% of US residents. Now this information is available for public use alongside affordable tools to work with and add to it.

Remaining blighted homes in Pontiac expected to be razed by December 2019

Crain’s Detroit Business

Of Pontiac's 916 blighted homes, only 99 remain, Bill Pulte says Removal effort started in 2014 A survey of Pontiac's 25,000 parcels using technology from Detroit-based Loveland Technologies LLC was completed in 2014.

Change the way of thinking about land

WIRED Japan

A social experiment that collectively purchases land seized by Detroit has transformed into a mapping enterprise and is growing as a social enterprise. I visited Loveland Technologies with a potential to change my mindset on land.

TREC: Neighborhoods Want A Say In How Development Happens

Bisnow

The 12-month process will begin with intensive data collection by Loveland Technologies, which will call upon local volunteers and paid community help to assist. Loveland is a technology mapping company that will capture detailed data on the three neighborhoods. It will end with a final plan for development that preserves the distinctive history and culture of each neighborhood, two of which have been identified as opportunity zones (West Dallas and The Bottom), eligible for federal tax incentives to drive private investment.

Q&A with LOVELAND Technologies' Jerry Paffendorf

LISC.org

LISC: How do you go about partnering with local community leaders in other cities? Jerry: Generally, there are two ways to work with our team and use our software. One easy way is to subscribe, either as an individual, team, or organization, to use our tools. Prices vary depending on the level of engagement, including an unlimited package that lets you create as many accounts as you want inside of your city or county. It’s like Oprah but with LOVELAND accounts instead of cars. You get a map! You get a map! You get a map!

Creating homes, curing blight

Soapbox

The initial phase of 100% Housing was confirming the estimate of vacant properties and assessing the condition of vacancies across Hamilton County. A partnership with Loveland Technologies, a Detroit-based firm that uses data and mapping to arm communities to fight blight provided the platform to collect the data. “Cincinnati could become a national model for such a broad-based partnership, and Loveland is excited to see what the future brings,” says Nick Downer, Loveland’s Ohio project manager.

Detroit battles tax penalties that create city of renters

The Christian Science Monitor

“The situation has improved, but not in the ways it’s being communicated entirely,” says Jerry Paffendorf, co-founder of Detroit-based Loveland Technologies, which sells professional mapping services to municipalities. Mr. Paffendorf has studied the foreclosure crisis issue closely for years. “Wayne County has codified into its budget needing all this delinquent tax money,” points out Paffendorf. “It creates this horrible catch-22. If you need that money, how in any sense is it right and fair to collect it by pushing people out of their homes?”

Hunger by the numbers: Forgotten Harvest takes a new data-driven approach

Crain’s Detroit Business

Forgotten Harvest worked with Data Driven Detroit to identify the flow of food going out to the community from all sources so it could see under-served areas. And Loveland Technologies adapted its system for updating vacant property information to help Forgotten Harvest identify where people seeking food come from to help the nonprofit understand where it needs to start concentrating volumes of food.

Detroit real estate game creates chaos in neighborhoods

Detroit Free Press

As of July, there were 3,959 structures and lots on the county's foreclosure list — a list that if nothing changes over this month, will be indicative of what is up for grabs in the 2018 Wayne County Tax Auction, which starts next month. The county did not provide occupancy stats in its list, but Loveland Technologies did an analysis and found 1,866 unoccupied structures, 1,405 occupied structures, 419 vacant lots and 269 unknowns.

GMAR Hosts 50th Anniversary Celebration of the Fair Housing Act

Pride Source

During the year-long commemoration, the NAR said it will examine community fair housing issues and advocate for changes to the FHA to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Harris was joined by Margaret Brown of the Fair Housing Center of Metropolitan Detroit; Stephanie White, executive director of Equality Michigan; Jerry Pattendorf of Loveland Technologies; and Michelle Oberholtzer of the United Community Housing Coalition.

Architecture vs. Climate Change: An expert panel, led by ARCHITECT’s Ned Cramer, speaks on combating climate change with design.

hive

In this subsequent video, Cramer challenged his panel of William McDonough, co-author, Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things; Adrian Foley, COO, Brookfield Residential Group, California; Serene Al-Momen, co-founder and CEO, Senseware.co; and Jerry Paffendorf, co-founder and CEO, Loveland Technologies, to explore where innovation fits into action that can transform how the built environment is designed to work.

Charter school: DPSCD clings to closed loophole to block it from purchasing abandoned elementary school

Michigan Watchdog

Detroit’s public school district has been struggling for years with nearly 200 schools being closed between 2000 and 2015, according to a 2017 report by LOVELAND Technologies - a Detroit-based company compiling a public database of every property in the country.

Detroit's Housing Crisis Is the Work of Its Own Government

Vice News

The city overtaxed homeowners for years. Those who couldn’t pay are still feeling the pain.

People Are Making Big Money Kicking Detroit Residents Out Of Their Homes

Vice News / HBO

A VICE News HBO piece on Detroit's tax foreclosure problem, including an interview with Loveland CEO, Jerry Paffendorf, at the Loveland office in downtown Detroit

Quicken Loans aims to help 65,000 Detroit households avoid tax foreclosure

Detroit Metro Times

Through the "Neighbor to Neighbor" effort, QLCIF and the United Community Housing Coalition will partner with about two dozen community groups and nonprofits to reach some 65,000 Detroit households behind on their taxes by yearend. The door knockers will notify homeowners of assistance available and then point them to upcoming workshops where they can get help applying for the programs.

Tech, Open Data Are Crucial in Long-Term Recovery Following Hurricane Harvey

Government Technology

Rosenburg says that with Loveland, his volunteers can go door to door, stand in front of a home, answer a series of questions on a device, and feed accurate information to a database in real time, along with pictures that precisely illustrate damage. SBP can then use that data to direct volunteers, and, perhaps more important, to show governmental response agencies at all levels exactly what’s happening on the ground and who is still in need. Simply put, mapped GIS data is a vital reference.

Who owns that house down the street? “Flint Property Portal” goes live with answers

East Village Magazine

Flint residents have a new way to find and report information about properties in the city–from who owns them, to demolition status, to building conditions–thanks to a new website that went live Aug. 21.

How Mapping Disasters Can Help Devastated Communities Rally

The Pew Charitable Trusts

Beers said one advantage of using the mapping software is that she can analyze the data in real time, making critical information available to volunteers and other relief organizations almost instantaneously. “They could see the results without me having to take my computer all over town,” she said.

New Technology Helps Tackle Blight in Bibb County

13WMAZ

“There are a lot of people who actually want to get involved. They want to buy properties. They want to revitalize Macon, so it helps with the conversation of we want to improve our community,” said Dixon.

Opinion: We can do something to stop tax foreclosures

Detroit Free Press

Auctioning these homes tends to lead to vacancy and dereliction. Eventually, they will need to be demolished. The auction works against three of Duggan’s major goals: grow the population, eliminate blight, and don’t push out poor people.

Loveland mapped every foreclosed and auctioned property in Detroit since 2002

Detroit Metro Times

We all know tax foreclosures are a problem in Detroit, but this map from Loveland Technologies really puts the horror of the situation into perspective. Shown are all of the properties that have been foreclosed [and auctioned] in the city over the past 15 years.

Mapping blight at the parcel level in Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati: Janis Bowdler (Opinion)

cleveland.com

Using cutting-edge data visualization technology, the team will overlay publicly available data from multiple sources at the parcel level, providing community members with a clear and accurate picture of troublesome properties, neighborhood conditions, and opportunities for redevelopment.

Mapping Detroit, Inch by Inch

New York Times

Loveland’s ambitious project cannot fully solve the problems vacant and abandoned properties have wrought in the Motor City, but it shows how technology can be used as one tool among many in solving the seemingly intractable challenges of urbanism.

Ohio Cities Bring High-Tech Tools to the Fight Against Blight

Next City

The Ohio dashboards will be different for each city. In Cleveland, where WRLC completed a comprehensive survey last year, property information will be put online and residents will be engaged in keeping it updated. Rokakis says city officials will use the data to target blight removal and identify properties with redevelopment potential.

Researchers find Detroit Public Schools have struggled from the beginning

Michigan Radio

John Grover and Yvette van der Velde co-authored the report, A School District In Crisis. We’re walking through Hutchins because the authors think it’s a classic example of how nearly 200 buildings have been closed in the last 20 years, how neighborhoods have suffered because of the empty buildings, and how the Detroit School District continues to spiral downward.

The Blight-Fighting Solution for Saving 40,000 Detroiters From Eviction

Next City

Jerry Paffendorf thinks he knows the secret to reducing vacancy in Detroit — and he wants to be the city’s next tax auction czar.

Loveland Technologies launches custom mapping platform, Site Control

Model D

Loveland's newest product is Site Control, a software-as-a-service platform that enables users to open personal accounts within Loveland Technologies software and create their own custom maps.

Detroit Battles Blight Through Crowdsourced Mapping Project

Forbes

Thanks to Loveland Technologies’ Motor City Mapping project, neighborhood groups, city officials and potential property developers can check the precise condition of almost 400,000 buildings.

How a "Holy Shit Visualization" Could Transform Detroit

Techpresident

Evans offers a real-world example of the importance of accessibility: a homeowner who wants to attack blight in her neighborhood by mowing the lawns of unoccupied houses on her street needs a simple way to know whether properties are occupied or not. “Accessibility is the real open data. Just having it open isn’t important if people can’t utilize it.”

Mapping Detroit

re/code

In Detroit, says Loveland Technologies CEO Jerry Paffendorf, “Underlying every other crisis in the city was an information crisis.”

What's Driving the Next Detroit

re/code

But Detroit, especially downtown Detroit, is rebounding — and fast. For two centuries, the city’s motto has been “We hope for better things; it will arise from the ashes.”

We need to rethink foreclosure in Detroit

Detroit Free Press

For years, we have asked: How much is it worth? How much can you get for it? These are the wrong questions. The standard by which every property decision in Detroit should be gauged is this: What impact will it have on the neighborhood?

Hamtramck and Highland Park to Begin Surveying Blight

dbusiness

"This application is going to revolutionize what the city is doing — making compiling and combating blight so much easier."

Survey to assess Highland Park, Hamtramck properties

Detroit News

Beginning Monday, residents in Hamtramck and Highland Park may see surveyors canvasing the streets — smartphone in hand — to capture images and assess the conditions of 13,000 parcels in both cities.

Mapping Blight in Detroit?

Here and Now

The company’s programs and databases give Detroit “x-ray glasses” on its troubled properties, allowing authorities to start rebuilding and investors to find opportunities.

How Detroit has streamlined its fight against blight

PBS

We want blexting to be part of what it means to be a citizen. You mow your lawn. You take out the trash. You blext properties in your neighborhood.

Detroit and Big Data Take On Blight

Bloomberg View

Impressed with Paffendorf's zeal, the city's Blight Task Force, established by President Barack Obama and funded by foundations and the state Housing Development Authority, hired his team to visit every property in the city.

'Blexting' (blight+texting) app enlists community to help Detroit fight blight

mlive.com

Now, with the Motor City Mapping project’s Blexting app live, anyone can “blext” a property to keep the information on the city’s 378,723 properties updated, while also providing a tool for the DLBA and the Blight Removal Task Force in informing its decisions.

Residents in Detroit get trained to use smartphone app, help update blighted property database

Fox Business

Several other cities, including Chicago and New Orleans, have shown some interest in the app based on how it's been used in Detroit, said Lauren Hood, community engagement manager for Detroit-based Loveland Technologies.

The Post-Post-Apocalyptic Detroit

The New York Times

The lack of good information was standing in the way of rational decision-making. When problems could be mapped, Paffendorf believed, they came to seem less hopeless, more explainable, more fixable. Hence the idea behind Loveland.

Look at this interactive map for insight into one of Detroit's biggest problems

Michigan Radio

"What we try to do is make a much more intuitive and responsive platform that presents that information clearly," said Alsup. "And isn't just a resource for looking at one data point in the context of one property, but really being able to see well, 'What's going on around that property? How is the neighborhood trending?'"

“Blexts” Enable a Quantified Blight Movement in Detroit

Techonomy

Crowdsourcing will come into play too: In late March, the maps will be made public, so that members of the community can make corrections and comments.

Detroit Maps Entire City to Find Bad Buildings

NPR

Lauren Hood works with Loveland Technologies, a company that developed a new way of mapping Detroit. They call it "blexting"

A Picture of Detroit Ruin, Street by Forlorn Street

The New York Times

“If you know how to work a cellphone, you could do this,” said Tamera Smith, who described herself as a mother studying to be a medical assistant who does hair and nails on the side. She reached out an open car window to take a picture of a shuttered business, then rode on to the next place.

LOVELAND's Passion: Battle Blight

Crain's Detroit Business

Few people on the committee had heard of Loveland, let alone that Paffendorf was a mastermind behind the campaign to manufacture and install a 10-foot-tall bronze statue of Robocop.

10 Most Innovative Companies in Local

Fast Company

With its mobile app Blexting (that's blight + texting), the Detroit-based company is powering Motor City Mapping, the first attempt to catalog the condition of every piece of property in the city.

Motor City Mapping Project Takes Aim at Detroit Blight

Voice of America

A new task force charged with revitalizing the city is spearheading an effort to electronically catalog each troubled property. The Motor City Mapping Project is on the cutting edge of technology and aims to give city planners a complete look at the task of eliminating blight in Detroit.

detroit told in a social map of distressed property taxes

designboom

the compilation of data showcases the county's online tax payment portal, where the tax status of every property in the city is assembled into what is called a 'tax distress map'. the statistics visually demonstrate that half of detroit is not paying property taxes - where a quarter of the city is eligible for tax foreclosure seen with a revenue gap of $450 million.

Detroit company launches online map of foreclosed homes

Detroit News

"If the data is in a closet, it's not going to change," said Alex Alsup, the chief product officer at Loveland Technologies, the company behind the website. Wayne County Deputy Treasurer David Szymanski praised the project, saying it serves "as an excellent tool in the rebirth of this great city."

A Stunning Visual of Detroit's Tax Situation From Why Don't We Own This

Curbed

Starting Friday morning, users will find a new, more powerful WDWOT, with added features and information. And it's right on time -- this year's foreclosure map is absolutely terrifying.

No property left behind recapped

Model D

An hour later, it was standing room only. The audience was composed of a diverse group of Detroiters, some of whom had been negatively affected by the auction, some of whom had purchased properties in the auction, and others who were simply curious.

What can be done with Detroit's thousands of empty properties?

mlive.com

Until properties from the recent auction are sorted out, Loveland Technologies will be focused on foreclosure prevention, staff member Alex Alsup said Wednesday night. A large part of that will be educating the some 43,000 residents at risk of losing their homes to tax foreclosure. Alsup said that in the past some homeowners have thought that they could buy their house back in the second round of the auction at less what they owe in taxes, "an extremely risky proposition."

Wayne County Foreclosed Property Auction: Jerry Paffendorf And Alex Alsup Talk No Property Left Behind

Huffington Post

Building on that, why not clearly show people where they are, what they are, let them talk about them, apply for them, consider best options, offer contracts to clean, build or deconstruct them? Then migrate the successes of that to dealing with the city's other 120,000 or whatever number of vacant lots and buildings. That's part of our focus with Why Don't We Own This? and we're ready to work with any level of government that can make it happen at scale.

Wayne County Tax Auction attracts thousands of bidders in Detroit

Model D

Paffendorf toured 20 empty homes that are up for auction Monday, meeting maybe 15 neighbors. "None of them had any clue the auction was happening," Paffendorf wrote in an email.

Website Engages Community in County Tax Auction

Mode Shift

"I've seen people being a lot more vocal about plans for properties, which is a really constructive conversation to have in the light of day, rather than a bunch of people feeling blindly around the auction and running into other peoples plans and interests," says Alex Alsup of LOVELAND.

Deal With It, Detroit

Huffington Post

With properties freshly left-over from the auction, there's a total logic for why they should be tracked and managed this way, serving as a sort of virtual land bank. Successes from the approach can then be applied to the tens and tens of thousands of other empty buildings and vacant lots not at this auction.

Online tool helps buyers navigate auction

Detroit News

"We are trying to build a better Detroit through transparency," he said. "The city is just so bad at that. There is an uninformed people and an uninformed marketplace, which makes it somewhat impossible for a democracy and a market to function properly."

Expect More Detroit

Huffington Post

I recently met up with Jerry P. holding a roundtable discussion at a bar called PJ's Lagerhouse, where each night that week, they had posted up for hours and invited anyone interested in learning more, contributing opinions, or spreading the word. Keep in mind that they stand to make zero dollars from the sale of any of the homes.

Thinking Small, Thinking Big, Wondering Who Owns What

B4BConnect

"There's no easy resource to take you through the next steps of, 'Where do you go next, who do you get on the phone or ask if you want to buy it, or get permission if you want to build something somewhere.' So, a lot of the tools we build are designed to answer just that question, they're like x-ray glasses to see what's really going on in the city, in the physical space around you."

LOVELAND Tech leverages new tax auction to grow WhyDontWeOwnThis.com

Southeast Michigan Startup

It is looking to create a bigger conversation about vacant, underutilized property next fall at the next Wayne County Tax Foreclosure Auction. Paffendorf equates it with a aggressive grassroots effort to find owners for every building. "LOVELAND has been talking very seriously about the possibility of doing a large crowd-funding effort for next fall's auction," Paffendorf says. "We're think of it as a no property left behind thing."

NXNEi Wrap Up: Can Crowdfunding Save Detroit?

Toronto Standard

The idea has since been moved from inches to city scale with a full-blown virtual city map complete with advanced data about Detroit properties – including detailed information pertaining to auctions. It's a gamified way to look at property ownership and it has become, to Paffendorf's surprise, a quasi-government in itself.

Wayne County To Hold Tax Auction On Foreclosed Properties Starting June 22

Huffington Post

For those who want to streamline the process, the Detroit-based tech startup Loveland Technologies is offering a free online service that provides information about the auction's properties at whydontweownthis.com, which features an easy-to-use interactive map and Google Street View images of properties.

What's New With Loveland Technologies, Axonia, 3D Biomatrix?

Xconomy

Paffendorf says he looks forward to working with Yeoman's partner/manager James Feagin again. “He has a lot of interesting ideas for how to bring diverse groups into Detroit,” Paffendorf says. One idea is Peak Population Day, where organizers would try to lure 1.3 million people to the city for a massive block party along Woodward Avenue from the Riverfront to 8 Mile. That will require building some digital tools for organizing big groups, which Loveland is working on now.

The Rust Belt Revival: What's Happening in Detroit, Michigan

Details

Making this information transparent, Paffendorf reasons, will spur the sale and repair of properties—a vital service in a city where more than a third of all residential parcels are vacant.

Detroit Civic Engagement Grants Award Groups $65,000 From Knight Foundation, CEOs For Cities

Huffington Post

LOVELAND Technologies is planning a project called Imagine Detroit Together, a technological and organizational infrastructure that allows Detroiters to link up with one another rapidly for large-scale demonstrations of unity.

Call to Action

Huffington Post

The goal of the event is to kick off a 30 day drive that will generate 10,000 new volunteer hours for neighborhood-based not-for-profits. The event will introduce a new, web-based data site that will help volunteers match themselves with not-for-profits. This tool, developed by Loveland, will build on the platform developed for "Why Don't We Own This?" The site will be the region's largest, web-based collection of volunteer opportunities...

Jerry Paffendorf Wants To Transform Detroit Real Estate, Make Some Cool Stuff

Huffington Post

"You try things and some work, some don't, you retreat back into your shell a little bit, and then you try again," he says. "I try to just listen to people, go to neighborhood meetings. Social permission goes a long way. You'll get smacked if you don't make friends, don't put in some time to get people's stories."

Can Motor City restart its engines?

The Independent

His new venture, Loveland Technologies, is an experiment in using cyber-technology to tackle Detroit's huge housing and delinquent property problems... He recently launched an interactive web site mapping and profiling for potential buyers each of the roughly 13,000 houses in foreclosure that the city put up for sale in an eBay-style auction last month. Prices started at about $500.

The Costs of That "$500 House" in Detroit

Bridge

It brings order to what used to be a phone book of confusing information, making it easily accessible to everyone — for free. It puts local residents on an even playing field with speculators so they can take charge of the problem properties in their neighborhood and turn them into assets.

Bidding Insanity: Buying Auction Properties In Bulk

Curbed

Ever been at the Dollar Store and thought, what the hell, give me that WHOLE SHELF! Such is the mentality that might apply to this round of the Wayne County Tax Auction's High Roller List.

Nonprofit to be foreclosure auction stand-ins in Wayne

Detroit News

That interactivity helped one city resident sidestep a potential auction disaster. A visitor to the site saw Michael Lee's metal finishing business on the auction list and posted a message about it.

Where the auction is: Q&A with surreal estate innovator Jerry Paffendorf

Model D

This is information everyone should have access to. If we try to charge people for it, we would just be repeating the same mistakes. That's not what we're about. There are people who are moving out of the city or missing out on opportunities because of the environmental conditions here.

DREAM OF THE DREAMY D HOME? WHY DON’T YOU OWN THIS?

Detroit Lives

What’s really great is that what was, for a very long time, a very murky and unclear process (as of last year when I participated) is getting much more visible and easier to circumnavigate– thanks to the good work of Team LOVELAND.

LOVELAND Technologies debuts WhyDontWeOwnThis.com for tax auction

Model D

This year's tax foreclosure auction promises to be the biggest yet with a record number of properties and Wayne County extensively promoting it... Paffendorf and his two other co-founders at LOVELAND Technologies hope WhyDontWeOwnThis.com will enable locals to buy problem properties and turn them into assets, keeping them out of the hands of speculators and absentee landlords.

Make Sense of The Wayne County Tax Auction With This Map

Curbed

So thank goodness for LOVELAND Technologies and its founder Jerry Paffendorf who found this presentation of info wildly inadequate. "Someone needs to make this clear. Otherwise it's just a phone book."

The In Crowd

Metro Times Detroit

Either one incredibly wealthy entity buys you or a whole bunch invest in the success of your project without the legal sense of ownership and controls. The latter option is all about spiritual equity. - Jerry Paffendorf

Silverside Management grows apartment portfolio through new tech

Model D

This new mapping system would create an individual profile for each apartment, allowing perspective tenants to find out the basic information about the unit and take a virtual tour of it. The system also would make it easier for tenants to communicate with management to solve problems and increase the quality of life.

Sensationalizing Hope: Catching up with Erik Proulx of 'Lemonade: Detroit'

mlive.com

In addition to talks with IMDB, Proulx said he's had discussions with the folks at the Guinness Book of World Records, who tell him his film should set a new mark for the number of producers.

Innovative Crowdfunding and Social Mapping Systems from Loveland Technologies

Tech Cocktail

They create crowdfunding and social mapping systems, and rely on their unique brand and culture to mix real and virtual, fun and serious, story and software.

Loveland: Jerry Paffendorf and Mary Carter

The South End

“We want to do some more planting, gardening and landscaping; make it so it’s a visitable park,” Paffendorf said. “We want to get into building it out so that it feels good to go over and hang out at.”

RoboCop statue may be silly, but fundraising effort proves 'Detroit can be a futuristic city'

mlive.com

Detroit can be futuristic again, according to artist Jerry Paffendorf. Not simply by building a RoboCop statue, but by recreating itself in innovative ways.

Detroit: Emerging from the Ground Up

next billion

In Detroit, entrepreneurs rave that if you want to get something done, people will help you do it. Local business owners are often happy when another business opens on the same street-instead of taking away their business, it increases it by making their neighborhoods safer and nicer.

Update on "inchvesting" in Detroit

BoingBoing

Some "inchvestors" have been letting Loveland unfold before hatching development plans, but others have been ignited by the pace set by the project's directors. Loveland recently applied for support from the Knight Foundation to support development.

LOVELAND and the Imagination Age

Huffington Post

The Inches are a powerful metaphor for units of measurement in a shrinking city. The project is a collaborative hybrid-reality experiment, with the idea being that the crisis faced by Detroit is so massive that an inch is a simple platform on which to build, the same way a seed can become a tree.

Street artists put unique brand on Detroit

Detroit News

At 5:07 p.m. Saturday, the Coys will publicly unveil their newest — and most ambitious — project, a large $13,000 neon sign mounted on the Roosevelt Hotel on 14th off Michigan Avenue in Corktown. Called "No Vacancy," it plays off the emptiness of the defunct hotel and features pigeons, which are often seen in their work to represent their ubiquity in urban settings.

Investing in Detroit by the square inch

BoingBoing

The point of Loveland is to start somewhere, together, to connect with people, amplify the awesome and see where it goes. And so far, as the mayor of Loveland, I find the inchventure tremendous, for all its ostensible tiny-ness.

A word with team Loveland

After 5 Detroit

The first project that Loveland helped to fund was "Monumental Kitty". This was part of the Corktown Pedestrian Overpass Improvement Project connecting Corktown with downtown via a safe, lit and vibrant overpass.

Thinking small

Detroit Make it Here

People involved in the type of social entrepreneur projects DeBruyn and Paffendorf are working on find plenty of opportunity to work together in the real world too. And the scene in Detroit is open, DeBruyn said. Anyone with an idea shouldn't be too timid to speak up or think only cool, hipsters are welcome.

Catie Newell's Salvaged Landscape Reclaims an Arsoned Building in Detroit

Core77

Another fantastic project from Detroit: Catie Newell's Salvaged Landscape takes wood reclamation one step further, transforming burnt lumber from an arsoned house into a new spatial volume and material landscape. Supported by Detroit nonprofit The Imagination Station...

Micro is the new small. Progress, one micro step at a time.

techno // marketer

This way of thinking small can have a big impact. It's different, adds value to the community and to individuals and makes you sit back and think about the possibilities. Just think about micro funding a novel all the way up to a project to bring clean water to Africa.

Detroit Real Estate for $1 an Inch

The Lofts of Merchants Row

Whether it amounts to a huge revival of investment real estate in Detroit or an interesting art project is a moot point. Our focus is on the Loveland Project as another step in showing the world the creative talents in Detroit and the ability of Detroiters to reinvent (dare we say, ‘cultivate’?) what’s around them.

#140 Characters Conference: Making 'hope porn' frame-by-frame with 'Lemonade: Detroit'

mlive.com

Boston-based filmmaker Erik Proulx is working to tell a story of rebirth and reinvestment in Detroit, and to complete the project he's asking individuals to fund the project. Frame-by-frame.

The “Disney-Sized Imaginations” at Loveland Are Out to Reverse Detroit’s Decay with Digital Maps

Xconomy

“We started realizing that if we could get the real-life data, we could use the same social map system we have [for Plymouth and Hello World] and apply it to the whole city,” Paffendorf says. “You could mouse over every parcel and see who owns it; if it’s the city, if it’s private, if it’s vacant, if it’s for sale, then you could click on it and comment on it. Block by block, people in the city could have a conversation about the things they want to see.”

Wringing Art Out of the Rubble in Detroit

The New York Times

In June a group including Mr. Paffendorf of Loveland spent $1,000 for two abandoned houses across from the vacant Michigan Central Station, a symbol of Detroit’s decline, and, along with the Packard plant, a must-stop on any hardscrabble tour. They renamed the buildings — shells filled with debris and a few squatters — Imagination Station and hope to transform them into an artists’ enclave and green space.

Raze one, raise one

Metro Times Detroit

The Imagination Station is exploding from the ashes of a firebombed flophouse standing — barely — in the shadow of Detroit's abandoned, antique train station. Painted colors splash from a second story window, and people congregate on the lawn to plan the future.

Sim City Detroit

Detroit Moxie

Detroit has real problems and in addition to all the necessary ground work it needs new online and mobile solutions for connecting and empowering people and communities, increasing transparency, fundraising, mapping, planning, globally showcasing the great local work of the less internet-savvy, making it fun to participate in reinvention, and so on down the line.

Jerry Paffendorf on Imagination Station

WDET Craig Fahle Show

A New Micro-Colony For Detroit

PSFK

We went through appropriate city channels to try and purchase a specific lot for that but have been temporarily held up by who-knows-what city decision-making process, so the physical land for Hello World has yet to fully manifest. But that’s OK! It’s all part of the inchventure, and we promise to secure the land that people inchvest in as soon as we can.

At $1 a square, people get to use imagination

Detroit Free Press

Jerry Paffendorf, who spearheads a project to sell square-inch plots of land in the city, is building on the project's healthy Internet buzz to throw a bash Saturday at the Isaac Agree Downtown Synagogue and the adjacent Café D'Mongo's Speakeasy.

Invest in Detroit, One Inch At A Time

I Am Young Detroit

Half of everyone’s inchvestment in season 2 will go to the seven projects, including the Motor City Blight Busters and The Pedestrian Overpass Improvement Project. “We’re raising 1500 dollars to help do a sculpture called monumental kitty, which is going to be on the overpass by old Tiger Stadium. We keep working on the system trying to come up with fun ways to get people participating in the city...

Loveland: What's not to like?

SF Beta

At SF Beta last week, I had the chance to meet the folks behind Loveland, one of the coolest and most unique groups to ever pass through our doors — and that’s saying a lot.

LOVELAND interview on FutureTense

ABC Radio Australia

I would like to see Detroit get put back on the network. I find that idea very cool, and hopefully inspiring to other people, to think outside the box and begin a process of putting it back online, showing people things in the city. Inviting them to have an ownership stake in the city, however modest, still has a psychological impact.

Save Detroit! One Inch, One Dollar at a Time

Fast Company

Then there's Loveland, Jerry Paffendorf's "wild social network of people, literally built out of the dirt." Paffendorf bought a vacant lot for $500 and sold it, an inch at a time for $1 per inch, to almost 600 "inchvestors" around the world. It's called Plymouth.

Buy an inch of land in Detroit

Boing Boing

Today at Institute for the Future, Jerry Paffendorf is telling us about Loveland, his art/game/activism project to sell real land in Detroit, Michigan inch-by-inch, for $1/inch.

Inchvesting In Detroit: A Virtual Realty

NPR / All Things Considered

Paffendorf says Detroit is a place of opportunity and creativity. He shares an optimism about the city and his project with Ricki Collins. She's 9 years old and lives next door to the empty lot Paffendorf bought. Hers is the only house left on the block. "I want people to remember this place. Remember it. And I want people to come over so we can get to know each other, learn new things about each other," Ricki says.

Welcome to Loveland!

The Imagination Age

I'm working hard to turn my inches into opportunities to connect people in Detroit with a larger community of innovators around the world, and I need your help, your ideas, your support and most of all, your imagination. Inches are tiny, but I hope you'll think big.

Radio interview on The Craig Fahle Show

WDET

No property taxes. In some ways I look at loveland as a BS buffer - I own the property in the catalog of the city, I pay the taxes and give the inchvestors a clean-burning ownership experience. They have a piece of the world that's theirs, they can visit... all the fun things about having land, without the minuses of having to mow your lawn.

LOVELAND Is Rebuilding Detroit Through The Internet, One Square Inch At A Time

Motherboard.tv

One of the innovations here I think is that just as easily as you could buy a bag of virtual fertilizer at Farmville on Facebook, you could have an actual property, even if it is Loveland terms of ownership. That is a way you could make a whole bunch of ownership and redevelopment pretty seamless. We’ve got to find ways to make land ownership more simple, cheap, fun, and social. And then highly creative.

$1 later, I own part of 'Loveland'

Detroit News

I told him I plan to put a tomato plant on my square inch. The stem itself would take up about that much space, and if any adjoining landowners or passers-by want to help themselves to a tomato, that'd be fine with me.

LOVELAND Interview with Wayne Clingman

Blog Talk Radio

I'm always motivated to work on and open up new spaces, where there's not just one particular application, but with this model you can run a number of different activities through it. Just taking land and parceling it out in such a way, even land so small, inspires ideas in everything from games and reenactments to urban farming to murals to solar power...

Loveland Project Explores Micro-Real Estate and Collective Land Use

PSFK

The metaphor of city as canvas works especially well for Detroit, a city seeking a new identity. This relatively ‘open’ landscape, coupled with inexpensive living and even cheaper real estate, make Detroit an ideal setting for these roots rebuilding efforts.