The Mortgage Meltdown: Up Close and Personal
Please join me in welcoming Debbie L. Sklar to the editorial staff at Blown Mortgage. She’s going to be writing a couple of articles a week for us here as we work to bring you ever-improving content. I’ll let Debbie introduce herself with her first post below:
“Mortgage Mania” — this is a term that is often used when describing the craziness that has taken the country by storm thanks to those in the mortgage business. I have a few choice other phrases to describe my own personal feelings, however, they aren’t quite appropriate for an open blog.
While some say they feel sorry for those mortgage lenders, brokers, loan officers, etc., I can’t say that I do – at all.
Living in California for the past 10 years, I have somewhat learned to “go with the laid back California attitude,” but I still maintain many of my Midwestern values. What does that mean? Well, that I try to maintain and abide by a strong work ethics. So, it is hard for me to feel sorry for an entire industry – an industry that has indeed thrown homeowners across the country into a tailspin.
Just in Southern California alone the number of Notice of Defaults rose in July by leaps and bounds according to a report by DataQuick Research. I felt the pain personally after I received a notice from my landlord’s creditors stating that he and his wife had filed for Chapter 7 Bankruptcy.
What did that mean to me? Well, after three years of being the perfect tenant, never missing a month’s rent, and taking care of their home better than they did, I had to move quickly – like within a week to find a new home — before the bank showed up to tell me their home was going into foreclosure.
Apparently, Mr. Landlord’s own home, a big McMansion that he and his wife had purchased in 2005, had already been in default for quite some time.
Ok, sure, I wasn’t the first or the last to experience such a blow! And there is little doubt in my mind that this mortgage meltdown will continue and cause more heartache for homeowners from Coast to Coast.
In these posts, I am hoping to bring you, the reader, in layman’s terms, the latest info in this saga of never-ending rollercoaster events as we move into 2009. Many critics report that we won’t see the housing market pick up for awhile. Check out the report from Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson as reported back in May on money.cnn.com.
Well, let’s hope Paulson is way off base, and try to keep our fingers crossed that more Americans won’t lose their homes. Maybe we need to wipe out the entire mortgage industry – even though most have already closed their doors according to ml-implode.com – perhaps it’s time to start fresh? Just a thought. Stay tuned.
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The writer, Debbie L. Sklar is a 20+year journalism veteran residing in Southern California, where she is a writer, columnist and editor for many local, regional and national publications. She will be a regular contributor to Blown Mortgage and may be reached via e-mail at DebbieSklar@cox.net.