South Florida tenants trapped inside after the real estate crisis

Outside the Bible Calvary Alliance Church, Jean Celin holding court. Wearing a smart black suit, holding his neck headset and mobile phone in hand, Celin greet the church flow while taking a phone call after another.

Celin is an assistant pastor at a church in Delray Beach Haiti. He has served here for 30 years - almost as long as he was in the United States.

"Everybody likes him," said Marc Horace, senior pastor at Calvary. "She was very helpful, he's very giving."

But over the last seven years, Celin and his wife Marie have struggled to remain a part of what he calls "real family." First, the house they owned for 20 years was seized. Then they moved to a series of leasing whose owners are under water, too.

Affordable housing supporters said it was impossible to know how many Floridians are in the same position, but the story is not uncommon. Although South Florida foreclosure rate has dropped 50 percent from a year ago, it is still twice the national level, according to CoreLogic. Moody's Analytics estimates that one of every 87 homes in the area were in foreclosure in the first quarter. In Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties, about 16 percent of mortgaged homes are underwater, with loans larger than the current value, according to Zillow.com