Delicious Irony

Neighborhood blighted by overcrowding? In today's housing market, regulating that will likely yield abandoned homes. Thanks, subprime lending!

But on a new color-coded map created by the county to plot foreclosures in Fairfax from January 2007 though the end of last month, two bright orange spots dominate. Both also happen to be the focus of intensive efforts to curb overcrowding: the Springfield neighborhoods that include the Hanover Avenue house, and portions of Herndon. In Herndon's case, the regulatory push has been led by the town government, which has instituted multiple policies aimed at making the community less hospitable to illegal immigrants.

No hard numbers are available to quantify the correlation between overcrowding enforcement and foreclosures. But Supervisor Jeff C. McKay (D-Lee) said the evidence he has seen leaves him with little doubt. Owners unable to subsidize their mortgage payments with illegal numbers of occupants have been unable to keep their houses.

Ha. Ha. Ha.