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Arlene Nickless (Photo from screenshot of Lansing Journal video)
Nearly nine years ago, Arlene Nickless had her Lansing-area home rebuilt by designers from ABC's "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition," with help from hundreds of volunteers. The restoration project followed the death of her husband Tim Nickless, a nurse, from Hepatitis C.
Now, she's getting kicked out of the house after struggling for years with keeping up with the mortgage, reports Beth LeBlanc of the Lansing State Journal.
The home in Holt, a town outside Lansing, has gone into foreclosure and is up for auction. So she must vacate by Monday.
“When I stepped out of the house the day Extreme Makeover came, you will see me say ‘I can’t believe this is happening,’” she tells the State Journal. “And, truthfully, that’s what I feel right now: I can’t believe this is happening.”
LeBlanc reports:
On Sunday, cardboard boxes were stacked on the dark hardwood floors once showcased in nationwide broadcasts. The 2009 Ford Flex gifted with the home sat in the driveway hooked to a moving trailer. And the overwhelming feeling a tearful Arlene Nickless had all those years ago took on a different tenor.
“When I stepped out of the house the day Extreme Makeover came, you will see me say ‘I can’t believe this is happening,’” she said. “And, truthfully, that’s what I feel right now: I can’t believe this is happening.”
Karen Schroeder, vice president for East Lansing-based Mayberry Homes, the general contractor for the home, tells the Lansing Journal that the home makeover, state and banking officials were able to whittle the Nickless family’s mortgage from about $140,000 to $30,000, and lower the interest rate considerably.
But the home's annual taxes more than tripled from 2008 to 2009, according to county records, from about $2,000 in 2008 to about $7,500 in 2009.