CORRECTION

Two foreclosures were reported last year in the 417-home Fairfield neighborhood in Durham. An article Sunday in the Q section inaccurately reported the number based on an analysis by the Community Reinvestment Association of North Carolina. The association got its definition of the Fairfield neighborhood from a Durham County government Web page that shows a much larger geographical area than Fairfield actually covers.

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When Tony and Mary Garrett bought an old bungalow in East Durham seven years ago, they were greeted with scores of warnings about fixing up a home in a neighborhood plagued by crime.

There were few cautions, though, about their subprime loan with interest rates that would balloon to the point that their dream of homeownership almost burst.

"We went into this with our eyes wide shut, so to speak," Tony Garrett said. "Every mortgage package should have red flags beside something that is going to hurt you."

The Garretts worried they might have to surrender their home to a mortgage company mired in the subprime lending crisis. But thanks to the advice of a church elder and a refinancing orchestrated by the Durham Regional Community Development Group, the couple staved off foreclosure.

The Garretts' success story brought joyful tidings beyond their one household.

Had they been forced to walk away from their home, a neighborhood railing against crime and urban blight might have had one more abandoned property in its midst. As devastating as foreclosure can be for one family, it also can tear at the fabric of a neighborhood, a community, an entire region.

In Durham, a city where taxpayers, community development groups and nonprofits have invested much time and money into reinvigorating neighborhoods in decline, no one wants to see the added layer of problems a mortgage crisis might bring.

The Community Reinvestment Association of North Carolina, a Durham-based organization that has pushed for state and federal regulatory change while fighting predatory lending practices, recently released an extensive analysis of foreclosures in the Bull City.

"We chose Durham because it is our own backyard," said Adam Rust, one of the researchers and authors of the study "Empty Houses and Broken Dreams." "I would say Durham is probably not the worst case around. There certainly are more foreclosure actions going on in Wake County, but we haven't done enough study to talk about what's going on there. Orange County seems to be immune."

As home foreclosures hit record levels across the country, the Triangle real estate market is feeling the pinch more and more.

Foreclosure filings in the Triangle began rising in 2006 and increased 14.6 percent last year to a total of 7,388.

In the first six months of 2007, 3,578 foreclosure filings took place in Wake, Durham, Orange and Johnston counties. That number rose to nearly 4,000 for the first six months of this year.

Even with the Federal Reserve promising new regulations in the coming week for mortgage lending, housing experts, both nationally and locally, say foreclosure numbers will keep rising for the foreseeable future.

While California, Florida, Nevada and Arizona continue to be the hardest-hit states, Triangle housing advocates and counselors are hearing more hardscrabble stories that don't always end as happily as the Garretts'.

"It is becoming a depressing job," said Angella Coleman, a housing counselor at the nonprofit Durham Affordable Housing Coalition. "I'm trying to keep hope alive, but I'm waving my flag here: 'Help me. Help me.' "

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