A real estate organization is seeking to work with Miami-Dade County to help turn bank-owned properties into affordable deals for needy black families.

The South Florida Board of Realtists, which specializes in serving the African-American community, submitted its application in April through the Miami-Dade Office of Community and Economic Development to participate in its home stabilization program. The group seeks to rehabilitate, finance and sell distressed properties to minority families, with the county using its share of federal stabilization funds to assist with down payments and closing costs.

The Realtists organization is the local branch of the National Association of Real Estate Brokers, which was founded in 1947.

The Realtists have already helped hundreds of people, including 31-year-old Dirshon Baker, buy their first home. The monthly cost of Baker’s $215,000 home is about the same as it was when she rented an apartment.

Realtists President Danny Felton and VP T.C. Cason helped the Baker family get financing and laid the groundwork for them to move in.

Felton, owner of Mortgage Experts of South Florida, said homes would be priced to be affordable, with brokers making market-rate commissions for transactions.

“The price of the home is based on the acquisition price and rehabilitation price. That is the acquisition price for the buyer, so it becomes a really good deal,” he said. “It is not like we put a profit into the price.”

Miami-Dade has received $62 million, the single largest allocation of Neighborhood Stabilization Program funds for any local government, under the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008. The federal initiative is aimed at helping local governments clean up the foreclosure mess and stabilize the housing market.

The county wants to use the money to help finance home acquisitions, rehabilitation of foreclosed single-family homes for resale and multifamily properties to be used as rentals.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development approved the plan on Jan. 12, and the county is awaiting the execution of the grant agreement, according to the county Web site.

Calls to Community and Economic Development Director Shalley Jones Horn were not returned by deadline.

Expanding the program

Miami-Dade also has requested an additional $162 million from HUD to expand the program.

Its application for the extra home cash says the county expects to have as many as 18,750 bank-owned properties by the end of the year.

Miami-Dade points to several factors driving its foreclosure crisis, including rising county unemployment, which in June was 11.5 percent, nearly double what it was the same time last year. That translated to about 141,000 county residents out of work in June out of a labor pool of 1.23 million. Many of the jobs have been lost in some of the county’s most prominent industries, including retail, service and construction sectors.

The county hopes the program will create jobs and help some of the county’s needy residents.

“Investing funding in these types of transactions will yield the greatest benefit to the county by preserving affordable housing, decreasing blight, increasing employment and tapering the number of foreclosures occurring,” the county’s application states.

Grant Stern, owner of Morningside Mortgage Corp., said the coming months will create a lot of opportunity for organizations like the Realtists. The growing volume of bank-owned property is spurring lenders to seek ways to get problem assets off their books.

Stern said the biggest challenge would be getting the word out about the program and how to access it.

He said: “It’s not well advertised that there is money available to do this.”

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