Wilherst Program Rescues REOs and Provides AH.(Managing REO)

Byline: Amilda Dymi

Tampa, FL-Experts in the real estate-owned marketplace have launched Wilherst Oxford LLC, a new venture capital company whose goal, they say, "is to spearhead a real estate rescue program" focused on generating opportunities for first-time and lower-income homebuyers in the country's inner cities.

It is an effort to create new homeowners in times when the crisis has reduced affordable financing options for these borrowers.

Peter Monroe, Resolution Trust Corp. oversight board president and CEO from 1990 to 1993, has joined forces with other REO experts to create the new firm.

"The RTC successfully oversaw the largest liquidation of REO in our nation's history," he recalled, noting the experience has enabled him to be an REO business expert. His experience includes chief operating officer of the Federal Housing Administration, which helps combine needed know-how about both REO and affordable housing resources. He is a licensed real estate broker and corporate lawyer who has also served as executive director of the Urban Land Institute Foundation and is a member of REOMAC, a research group dedicated to the expanding REO industry.

"Our fund will invest nationwide and across product lines from residential to income properties."

The new real estate rescue program will also provide borrowers with the option "to purchase and restructure defaulted mortgages to allow homeowners to remain in their homes," and help avoid foreclosure wherever it is possible, he said.