The political lead ball being kicked around by democrats and some republicans concerning the “mortgage crisis” is just another example of our once proud Republic turning into The Nanny State.
First of all, I remember quite a few socialists -um, I mean democrats and minority “leaders” in the mid to late 90’s going on and on about mortgage lenders discriminating against minorities. Pressure was applied to lenders to start lending to people who were (to put it politely) less than ideal candidates for a mortgage. Of course, lenders caved in to the pressure and started giving loans to people who not only lacked the credit history to qualify, many also lacked the income.
So, now that these lenders did exactly what the democrats and race hustlers wanted them to do, they are still the only folks at fault. Instead of being the racist lenders of the 1990’s who refused to lend to minorities, in 2007 and 2008 they are now predatory lenders who preyed on poor minorities with loans they knew these poor folks could never repay.
*blink*blink*
Ok, lets see if I have this right: Lenders who denied loans to people who didn’t qualify were racists when the people denied happen to be a minority. When they lower the bar and loan money to people who don’t qualify and those people default on the loan (because they didn’t qualify to begin with, thus meaning the likelihood of them being able to repay said loan was – well, unlikely) – now the lenders are predators. No word yet on what exactly these lenders would gain by loaning money that would never be repaid. According to democrats and race hustlers, all you really need to know is the lenders are evil and those who took out the loans are victims.
Another component of our “crisis” consists of folks who gambled in the housing market and lost. Housing prices were soaring and there were folks who wanted their piece of the pie. They waited too long to get in though. Instead of depositing the profit from the sale of their investment, the market slowed, housing prices dropped and their interest rates started rising. And, *shocker* not only can they not sell the house, since they chose a mortgage that didn’t have a fixed interest rate, they can’t afford to pay for the house either.
With tiny violins playing, we hear about those evil lenders in this component of our crisis too. Even though the gambling home owners clearly understood the terms of their mortgage, it’s not their fault they are facing foreclosure. Again, all you really need to know is the lenders are evil and those who took out the loans are victims.
When it comes to so called victims (well, victims according to democrats, which means folks who are certainly not victims of anything other than their own piss poor decision making skills) democrats are sure the only solution is government intervention. Somewhere in our Constitution, hidden away apparently in a place only socialists have access to, there is a secret clause that gives the government the authority to take money from people who have good decision making skills and give it to people who have poor decision making skills. The mortgage “crisis” is just the latest example of the democrats (and some republicans) wanting to take money from my family (and yours if you pay taxes) and give it to their “victims.” Never mind the fact that my family could use that money – politicians would rather give it to people who purchased homes they couldn’t afford instead of allowing my family to keep our money to use on the home we purchased that we could afford.
I have absolutely no sympathy for these so called victims whether they are idiots who gambled on buying a house to make a quick buck and lost – or bought a home they couldn’t afford. Both groups are adults. No one forced them at gun point to buy a home. They made a crappy decision and I hate to break it to them AND our politicians, but as adults, we should all be held responsible for our decisions. We’ve been responsible for our home buying decision…
In 2002 we moved from Alaska to our current state. At the time, husband had planned on retiring from the Army the next year and we wanted to purchase our first home. Six months prior to our move, we did what responsible adults do – we went over our budget carefully, decided on a price range we could comfortably afford and then set out to get pre-approved for a home loan.
Having worked hard over the last several years to pay off all of our debt, keep our credit rating perfect and save for a down payment, we felt confident that we’d easily get approved for a loan. It was no surprise when we were approved and were offered a good interest rate. The surprise was how much money we’d been pre-approved for. We knew our budget, we knew when we moved one of our children would start school and we’d need to become a two car family – and we knew if we bought a house for the amount we were pre-approved for, two cars would be out of the question. Mainly, we knew we wanted to own our own home, but we didn’t want to be house poor. We wanted to maintain our current lifestyle of being able to go out to eat or go on vacation without going into debt and if we were house poor all our extra money would go to mortgage payments.
From Alaska, I started shopping online for our dream house. I noticed that houses built after 1970 were a lot more money for a lot less house than those built around the turn of the century. I quickly fell in love with the idea of buying an old house with great character and bones that needed some TLC. We could get a 2,000 square foot house for tens of thousands of dollars less than a newer 1,000 square foot house.
When we arrived in our new state, after showing us several homes that were not what we were looking for, our first realtor said, “You know what your problem is?” I said, “No. What?” She said, “You have champagne tastes on a beer budget.” I’d planned on canning her before this statement, but yeah, it pretty much sealed her fate heh heh. I replied, “That may be true, but you know what? I usually get what I want.”
The next day we drove a few towns away from post and found a new realtor. I also found my dream home and our nice new realtor made some money while the attitude realtor only got a door in the ass 
.
Our house needed a new roof, the exterior painted, lots of overgrown vines and bushes removed, every room needed wallpaper and carpet removed and paint – but – the house was $30,000 below OUR budgeted amount (not the amount we were pre-approved for) and had great bones. We could move in and renovate a room at a time without acquiring any more debt than our mortgage. With husband retiring, we could survive (if we had to) on just his retirement check if he had trouble finding a job.
I won’t lie and say it’s been easy redoing the rooms I’ve completed. To be honest, since the last two surgeries I had and the continuing health problems I still have, it’s been extremely hard. Monday, I started working on redoing our kitchen cabinets (pictures on the way) – a project I did when we first moved in. However, after renovating our dining room and making it formal – the country blue kitchen cabinets are barf worthy next to the Tibetan Red on the dining room walls above the stained wood wainscoting and plate rail. I’ve put off painting the cabinets for two years and decided Monday that I’m going to feel like shit whether I sit here and feel sorry for myself or get in that kitchen and get those cabinets painted. It is taking me forever with lots of breaks, I’ve broken down and sobbed a few times – but I’m determined to get back to some sort of semblance of my old life.
Would I have wanted this house as badly had I known my body would turn out to be my own worst enemy? Honestly, I don’t know. Maybe not. However, I can say with absolute certainty that had I known my health would change so drastically when we were in the market for a house, I still would have looked for something in or below our price range. We would have made sure the house we chose didn’t make us house poor. We may have settled for one with less character and less work, but we would have purchased something in our price range. If we couldn’t have found one we liked in our price range, we would have rented until we found what we were looking for.
I guarantee you we wouldn’t have bought something we could not afford and then cried foul when we didn’t make the payments and the bank started foreclosing. And we damn sure wouldn’t have expected the tax payers of this great nation to bail us out of a situation WE CREATED. Then again, we don’t have our hands out expecting our government to provide for us either. I have parents, thank you. They stopped supporting me when I moved out on my own at 18. And I certainly didn’t then, and do not now, expect the government to step in and nanny me with handouts every time I make a bad decision. As an adult, I understand that actions have consequences and that I am responsible for myself. As a citizen of this great nation, I don’t expect our government to provide for me – but I’d appreciate it if my government would quit deciding FOR ME to reward bad behavior and decisions made by my fellow citizens. They are no better than me…they too should have to be responsible for themselves. If they make a bad decision, allow them to fall AND get up on their own. Maybe THEN we’d stop the horrid government dependent lifestyle our socialist politicians have created and instead, encourage adults to act like adults and get off the government teat.
