THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR

THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR documents the effects of the foreclosure crisis on Northeast Ohio and the neighborhoods of Slavic Village and East Cleveland – ground zero for this man-made disaster. There were many culpable parties including mortgage brokers, uninformed buyers, unscrupulous sellers who jacked up the price of the property, willfully blind appraisers who went along with inflated home prices, and mortgage bankers out to make mad money, and of course, Wall Street. At best these people simply ignored the warning signs in favor of a quick buck, at worst this was a giant conspiracy of complicity. And even though there were multiple guilty parties nobody ever went to jail except for a few small-time property brokers in places like Cleveland. This film examines the roots of this crisis; why it impacted Cleveland so badly; what the city had to do to clean up the mess; and most importantly…

…could this nightmare happen again?