SOUTHWEST HARBOR – The federal government will sell the 25-unit East Ridge Estates elderly housing project next month after foreclosing on owner Pamela Gleichman of Portland, officials said Wednesday.

Gleichman failed to settle her $1.44 million debt to the Rural Development Agency, formerly the U.S. Farmers Home Administration, by the Oct. 27 deadline.

Rural Development will sell the complex and 3.1 acres of land by auction on Dec. 12, according to officials. The auction will be held at 11 a.m. in the lobby of the Hancock County courthouse in Ellsworth.

Gleichman could not be reached Wednesday for comment.

Residents of the housing complex on East Ridge Road don’t have to worry about being displaced after the sale, Dale Holmes, Rural Development program director, said Wednesday.

Holmes said whomever buys the complex must agree to maintain it as a subsidized housing project for seniors until at least Aug. 21, 2008, when Gleichman’s original 20-year contract would have expired.

Gleichman reportedly is one of the largest owners of subsidized housing in the U.S. with 50 projects and 5,000 apartment units.

She had 29 outstanding loans for Maine projects alone when Rural Development filed the foreclosure action on the Southwest Harbor complex in April.

Gleichman’s original 1988 loan for East Ridge Estates was $1.2 million. At the time of the foreclosure action in April, she owed Rural Development $1.44 million, including $1.28 million in principal and advances and $156,000 in interest and late fees, according to court records.

East Ridge Estates is the second of Gleichman’s Maine projects to be foreclosed by Rural Development. The federal agency took back the 24-unit Sewell Commons housing complex in Washburn last November and sold it at auction to a Caribou firm, according to officials.

Gleichman and her development firm, Gleichman & Co., were named as defendants in the foreclosure action.

Holmes said he was not aware of any other Gleichman projects currently in default in Maine.