Negotiating the Path to Keeping a Home

Paul Helikson stepped into the swirling snow on the steps of the Deschutes County Courthouse on a Thursday morning just before Christmas and barked out the legal singsong that brought an all-too-familiar end to a homeowner’s dreams.

Another day, another foreclosure auction.

Helikson, a legal process server, works with most of the trustee companies that handle foreclosure operations in Central Oregon for the country’s major lenders, and business has been booming. The frequency of his legally scripted courthouse-steps auctions has gone from one every few days to about 15 a week as the real estate market has worsened, Helikson said. Still, it’s something that no one connected with the process enjoys.