Government Is The Problem - Not The Solution
- Login to post comments
Do you know people still living in their homes after defaulting on their mortgage payments? I do, and I wonder what that must be like. Some have been doing this for two years or more, so why doesn’t the bank evict them and auction the house?
Because it’s afraid to. Because then the bank would have to sell the house for whatever it would bring on today’s real estate market - and that would be much less than what the bank pretends it’s worth. Because it’s likely the bank has several such properties - along with other banks - and all those houses are valued at what they were worth five years ago and would sell today only at far less than the amount owed on them. They’re counted as assets on the bank’s books at no-longer-realistic prices. If banks dumped all that on the market, it would further depress real estate prices and put more mortgages underwater.
How long can this go on? Not forever. The banks keep putting it off hoping the economy will turn around and real estate prices will bounce back. Soon-to-be-former mortgagees can’t live rent-free indefinitely and they know that sooner or later they’ll be evicted - but they ride it as long as they can. They keep heating the place, shoveling the snow and mowing the lawn. The bank allows this to prevent values from sinking even further should the occupants move out and nobody took care of anything.Consider the uncertainty these circumstances generate. What if the roof leaks? The occupant thinks: “I should fix the roof, but this isn’t my house anymore. I’m a squatter here.” Will he tell the bank or just put a bucket under the leak? Bank and occupant let it ride. They wait to see what happens.
That uncertainty is very similar to what most Americans feel about our country. We know we’ve dug ourselves into a deep, deep hole we may never climb out of, but we’re letting it ride to see what happens. Serious investors won’t make moves until they see what happens in November’s election while the “Hope and Change” guy presides over a country increasingly hoping for change in who occupies the White House.
The rest is here.
I live in Central Maine, north of Newport. I have a friend in the real estate business. She has told me that there are literally hundreds of foreclosed homes within easy driving distance of where she lives. One of her jobs is to ride out occasionally and check on these homes, taking photographs of them, and writing reports to keep the banks who own them, posted as to what is going on with the houses.
Many have been broken into and had the plumbing and wiring stolen. Some are still occupied by the former mortgagees, while other are being "occupied" by transients. They just told me last week about one house that a couple moved into, the male called CMP and even had the power turned back on again. And nobody cares enough about this to even go evict the "occupiers"
What a sad state of affairs.
I think that if the banks are hoping that real estate is going to come back and all these, some now totally looted, homes are once again going to be worth what the banks still have them valued on their books, they are going to be very sadly mistaken!
I don't believe that day is ever coming again!
This is all very interesting to watch!
WC
Wood Canoe: We are old enough to have seen most of this happen in our lifetime. The current generation thinks this is th way it always was or was the result of policies of those in the past. So long as the government gives them the wherewithall to survive they don't bother to think why we got where we are and push to change it. There are not enough of us left who know the why and effect change. The proof of that will be evidenced on November 6.
One home in Palmyra was mortgaged to a bank in California. There is a barbed wire fence across the front. There are no doors, windows, cabinets or plumbing fixtures in the home. A ramp leads up to the front entrance where goats and sheep reside. The report to the bank said that the home had no value and that the local fire department would burn it for the fee of $1,500. This was one of the old Countrywide loans where they loaned 125% of the appraised value of the home. Many of the "homeowners" had never intended to keep the home. They just regarded the "no money down" mortgage as cheap rent. They took the money and ran.
For a look at how this big time you need only go to Detroit. The government cancer has now matasticising and we will see in November that it is no longer resectable.
- Login to post comments
The dichotomy is the same people who think the government (problem makers) is the problem have been seduced by the problem makers (government) that they can solve them. Like perpetual motion, that is impossible. In mathematics we would show it as problem makers’ ≠ problem solvers , government = problem makers therefore government ≠ problem solvers