On Tuesday, activists stood in front of two West Oakland foreclosures, proclaiming that they had "reclaimed" or "liberated" the properties as part of the "Occupy Our Homes" national day of action organized by the Occupy movement and community groups to highlight the foreclosure crisis.

"We're taking over houses until the (banks) give them back to people," Thaddeus Guidry, 24, said as he lit a barbecue in the front yard of a duplex on 10th Street near Mandela Parkway and other protesters milled around inside the property.

Over on Adeline Street, Gayla Newsome stood in front of the townhouse she'd lost to foreclosure after a job loss and divorce, and said, "I got in, and I'm going to be in," adding that the bank had rushed through a foreclosure, taking her by surprise.

In both cases, the reality is more nuanced than the scenarios outlined by protesters.

In both cases, others with legal claims to the properties said they had suffered harm from the occupations and disputed aspects of the protesters' narratives.

As of Sunday night the 10th Street property was still occupied by activists and the Adeline townhouse by Newsome's family.

10th Street duplex

Government mortgage giant Fannie Mae owns the duplex on 10th street. Organizers with Causa Justa :: Just Cause, the primary movers behind taking it over, said they selected it to highlight how Fannie Mae leaves its vast stock of foreclosed inventory vacant, contributing to neighborhood blight.

Indeed, the property had sat vacant for several months while it was offered for sale.

A local couple are in contract to buy it, however, and escrow was set to close this week.

"We invested our savings to purchase this property so the earnings can go into our infant daughter's college fund," said one of the buyers, who asked to withhold her name for fear of retribution. "We believe in rallies and marching to bring attention to political beliefs, but breaking and entering is not acceptable."

Told of the upcoming sale, Guidry said the house wasn't habitable because of gas line and plumbing issues.

"We are in possession of this house and planning on not going" anywhere, he said. "The federal government needs to find them another house that's suitable for a family to actually live in instead of giving them a house at the bottom of the barrel."

Adam Gold, co-director of Just Cause, said the group's research had not shown that the house was in escrow. Gold said he thought the couple should e-mail the people in the house to set up a time to talk to them "and see what the situation is."

Fannie Mae, which is still the legal owner, confirmed that the house is under contract.

"In cases where foreclosure cannot be prevented, it is important to find a new owner for the property as quickly as possible," Fannie Mae spokeswoman Keosha Burns said in a statement. "Any action or event that attempts to delay the sale of a foreclosed property destabilizes the neighborhood and hinders marketing recovery. We will work with local officials to remove anyone who is inside our properties illegally."

Adeline townhouse

Newsome bought the three-bedroom town home on Adeline in 1995 for $175,000. Her first mortgage, now serviced by JPMorgan Chase, was for $155,250. In 2007, she took out a home equity line of credit from Residential Capital Mortgage Income Fund.

That year, she lost the job she'd held for 14 years as executive director of the nonprofit Girls Inc. in Richmond. "I was able to hold on for a year on unemployment," she said, but she was struggling.

In mid-2009, she stopped paying Res Cap.

Res Cap is a private-money lender. "Our investors are mostly retirees," said Martin Goodman, president of the San Diego company. "The retired folks depend on the income."

Newsome sought a loan modification from Chase and said it told her she needed to be behind on her mortgage to qualify, so she skipped a couple of payments to Chase. Newsome said that Chase lost her loan-modification papers several times and eventually rejected her request.

Meanwhile, Res Cap, the second lender, moved to foreclose. Public records show it filed foreclosure notices in October 2009 and June 2010. The final foreclosure was recorded with the county in July 2010.

Newsome said she did not receive the notices. "It's very clear something didn't jibe," she said. "Certain steps should have been taken that were not."

Newsome said she used $30,000 of the Res Cap line of equity, but the foreclosure documents show a debt of $78,000.

Some of that may include her past-due amounts to Chase. Goodman said Res Cap paid to bring her Chase payments up to date and would pay off the money still owed to Chase with proceeds from selling the property. "We own the property subject to Chase's lien," he said.

Newsome filed for bankruptcy to try to keep the house but was unsuccessful. Res Cap won an unlawful detainer suit in Alameda County Superior Court against her in May, and she was evicted in July.

"I've been fighting for my property for two years," said Newsome, a single mother of three daughters. "I owned it for 15 years and only owed Chase a little over $100,000."

Her long tenure - which meant the house had equity - may have hurt her loan-modification chances. People familiar with lenders' decision making said they are more likely to foreclose on a house with equity because they can recover the full amount of their loan.

Trying to recover costs

Res Cap spent about $10,000 to fix up the townhouse for sale and listed it at $204,900 in November, Goodman said. It has spent about $30,000 so far on legal fees and costs, Goodman said. Newsome has another civil case pending against the company that is scheduled for trial in May 2012. Goodman said the lengthy process means Res Cap is likely to recover less than half of what it spent on the loan and expenses.

Newsome and her supporters, many of whom are from the community group Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, are focused on getting a loan modification from Chase and blame that lender for her situation.

"By claiming they did not receive the loan-modification applications, they let time pass that was wasted, causing me to go into default with the second lender," she said. Newsome found a new job as a technology saleswoman in 2009 and said she now could afford her previous mortgage payments but wasn't sure about the past-due amounts and penalties.

Chase spokesman Tom Kelly declined to comment on Newsome's specifics but said the bank has helped 704,000 people avoid foreclosure since 2009.

Goodman said he would be fine with stepping aside and letting Chase deal with the situation.

"If Chase wants to pay us back our loan amount and other expenses in full, we would gladly give the property back if they want to do a workout" with Newsome, he said. "We just want to recover our all-in number for the investors."