ragekage: It's not necessarily their fault if they suddenly owe 5% more than their home is worth, subby- but then I suppose it's hard to put nuance into a greenlightable headline.

The payment is still the same, if they aren't selling the negative appreciation doesn't affect them?

Using your logic: I owed 20% more than my car was worth the second I drove it off the lot, where's my bailout?

essucht: Ok, so Obama is going to pay my mortgage now like I was promised? And how about the gas for my car? Oh yeah, and when do I get my middle class tax cut?

You sure you're not talking about Osama?

Obligatory

I just closed on my first house and have a curren LTV of 90% and a 30 yr fixed rate mortgage at 4.875% so I'm getting a kick out of these replies... not so much at the article though....

purple helmet: Ok, Just because the house is worth less, their original loan terms haven't changed. If they could afford the payments when they got the loan, they should be able to continue affording them now. Unemployed? Plan for it. Save money. Don't overextend yourself, stupid.

As for the Boobies on this thread where some retard says it's not the owner's fault the house is worth less than what they owe, guess what? It's not my fault either, Why the fark should I pay for it for them? I have my own farking mortgage, thank you very much.

Fark Obama and fark you idiots who voted for him.

Many of these "underwater" in their homes treated the house as a piggybank. Interest only loans, no downpayment, etc.

They would get a loan, refinance 6 months later (and taking cash out on the perceived increase), spend and repeat. You betcha they ended up underwater.

Now it's time to pay the piper.

The old school practice of 10% - 20% down, may be the best. If all these folks in trouble had put some of their own money in the game, they would have thought it through in more detail

ringersol: The thought is that people are trapped into ARM rates that are ballooning and if only they could refi to a fixed rate, they could afford to stay (which has been shown statistically false over the last nine months.)

I'm wondering where these ballooning rates are myself. I have an ARM tied to the 1-year LIBOR, and there hasn't been a whole lot of ballooning going on:




I'm not familiar with what other indexes ARMs are based on. Which ones are trouble?

Hotlinking saved me from writing pretty much what's in the caption.
/My Representative. And he may run unopposed again.

GaryPDX: Currently, homeowners who owe 5% more than their homes are worth can refinance mortgages through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, part of a two-pronged approach to reduce the rapid-fire pace of foreclosures.

They just want as many people as possible under Barney Frank's control.

/ewwww

I really dislike a wide variety of politicians in America, but that guy takes the cake.

This all comes back to poor public education. If a stable economy relies on the public understanding of the basic, fundamental components of economics, then they probably are important enough to be required teaching.

Because an ignorant mass public can sometimes (like in this case) do more harm than good.

Yakk: I agree with FoxNews on this. Let the banks fail, let the car companies fail, let the homeowners lose their houses, let the states go bankrupt then round up everyone with nothing and nothing to do give them a day to learn how to use an automatic rifle and send them to Iran Poland.

*sigh*

ragekage: It's not necessarily their fault if they suddenly owe 5% more than their home is worth, subby- but then I suppose it's hard to put nuance into a greenlightable headline.

Investments and buying homes are risks. You are responsible for the risk, not me. Its their fault they bought at the height of the market. Its a poor decision.

Speaking of poor decision makers

I didn't RTFA. Is this about rich bankers, rich automakers, idiot SUV owners wanting a clunker bailout, or the Bush administration? I couldn't quite glean the exact poor decision makers from the subby headline.

(Tho I suppose there is the unlikely event that this is the Fark tradition of piling on the po' folk. That's always great fun and nobody important gets hurt.)

GaryPDX: They just want as many people as possible under Barney Frank's control.

/ewwww

America the Gimp.


Ewwwwwww!

Is this like the military expanding assistance to the underskilled bullet-dodgers?

apotheosis27: i love being a renter sucker giving all my money to some dude chilling on the beach in Miami instead of owning my own residence within my means.

Bobucles: This all comes back to poor public education. If a stable economy relies on the public understanding of the basic, fundamental components of economics, then they probably are important enough to be required teaching.

Because an ignorant mass public can sometimes (like in this case) do more harm than good.

Economics was only a one semester class in my public high school. Most of the time we learned about things like writing a check.

/Still better then most private schools I guess

All that money keeping millions of people from going homeless should instead be shovelled into a dozen B2 stealth bombers. Same with health care. Let the plebs die destitute and homeless, put that money into spy satellites and covert goat mind reading programs.

"It's great. It's good news," says Lawrence Yun, chief economist with the National Association of Realtors. "Many homes are way deeper underwater.

IDK sound like a righteous dude!

/totally

Obama expands assistance to poor decision makers

Isn't that what all the bailouts have been about?

painendstheass: All that money keeping millions of people from going homeless should instead be shovelled into a dozen B2 stealth bombers. Same with health care. Let the plebs die destitute and homeless, put that money into spy satellites and covert goat mind reading programs.

As someone who spends and saves responsibly and watched housing costs continue to slip just out of reach around here as irresponsible twits who make less than me priced me out, AND now i'm still renting (pissing away money) while they get to default and keep their homes...

ON MY F*CKING DIMEfark em.
when they get out of the gutter they can remember this little lesson & do it right next time.

oh and shoot the bankers and cut the military budget while we're at it.

sgilman: Obama's going to start helping republicans?

Came here to say that.

Conservationist: The Right: natural selection.

The Left: one big happy family, ESPECIALLY the incompetents, who always vote Democratic.

yes. that's how it works.

After President trust-fund fast-track harvard (wink-wink) twit, and Sarah Palin, I can't WAIT to see your next choice for qualified, experienced leadership. I think the next logical step is a sock puppet. (it's be against gay rights/pro anti-sodomy laws while simultaneously operating with a fist up its ass.)

yeah. You guys are f*cking great.

Another idiot move by an idiot. I am not surprised. All the idiots I know getting their houses foreclosed on are liberals. Not surprising either. Idiocy goes full circle.

toonz: now i'm still renting (pissing away money) while they get to default and keep their homes...

Stop believing the Realtor propaganda. Renting is NOT throwing your money away. Unless you like living in a van, you have to live somewhere. Unless buying is SIGNIFICANTLY cheaper than renting, you might as well keep renting and save/invest the money you aren't pissing away on a mortgage, taxes, insurance, and maintenance.

Do you ask people why they are pissing money away on food?

Crosshair: Do you ask people why they are pissing money away on food?

I only eat food that appreciates in value.

I get about a 3% return on my feces.

Poor decision makers, eh? That's a bit of a facer.

It's not just poor people with liars' loans (OMG ACORN), that are being impacted. We're now talking about responsible homeowners who found themselves, after 10-20 years of steady employment, without a job - sometimes both wage earners lose their jobs. People-who-are-better-than-everyone-else are always going on about how one should have 6 months living expenses. The average unemployment period is longer than that now; homeowners have run through their savings; and if anyone in the family became ill or suffer an accidental injury, there's the rest of their savings thanks to our f*cked up health care costs.

So shove it, eh?

Crosshair: toonz: now i'm still renting (pissing away money) while they get to default and keep their homes...

Stop believing the Realtor propaganda. Renting is NOT throwing your money away. Unless you like living in a van, you have to live somewhere. Unless buying is SIGNIFICANTLY cheaper than renting, you might as well keep renting and save/invest the money you aren't pissing away on a mortgage, taxes, insurance, and maintenance.

Do you ask people why they are pissing money away on food?

well CURRENTLY renting actually is probably the better way to go, but I'd just like to be able to get something better than a 60 year old shoebox with a bad roof, & walls and floors like PeeWee's playhouse next to a highway for under $500K around here at some point.

Soymilk: Poor decision makers, eh? That's a bit of a facer.

It's not just poor people with liars' loans (OMG ACORN), that are being impacted. We're now talking about responsible homeowners who found themselves, after 10-20 years of steady employment, without a job - sometimes both wage earners lose their jobs. People-who-are-better-than-everyone-else are always going on about how one should have 6 months living expenses. The average unemployment period is longer than that now; homeowners have run through their savings; and if anyone in the family became ill or suffer an accidental injury, there's the rest of their savings thanks to our f*cked up health care costs.

So shove it, eh?

Yep, shove it. If you made the bad decision to raid your 401(k) to keep paying for your depreciating home while you and your spouse were both unemployed then yes, shove it. Also, if you have 10-20 years of steady employment, you have a lot of equity built up in your home, and you don't qualify for this program. You can sell your house at firesale prices and still walk away with a check, not having to write one.

It still comes back to: this is your problem, not mine. You take a risk when you buy ANYTHING including any home. If you would have sold in 2006 at the height of the market, we wouldn't have taken all your profits away, so why are we taking all your losses away now?

not2conceited: It still comes back to: this is your problem, not mine. You take a risk when you buy ANYTHING including any home. If you would have sold in 2006 at the height of the market, we wouldn't have taken all your profits away, so why are we taking all your losses away now?

My goodness, so high and mighty. I hope nothing catastrophic ever happens to you or yours that will require you to dig into your savings, refinance your house, drop out of college, or delay going to a doctor for an illness because you've lost your family's health insurance along with your job.

Why are people still looking at their homes as investments?

Look at it as a place to live. You need one, no matter what your circumstances, so suck it up and pay your just debts on it.

Or walk away and let the true owner (the bank) get it back.

When I read the headline, I thought we were giving more money to the banks, or American vehicle manufacturers.

This is just as smart as the last 2 cock-ups

Soymilk:

My goodness, so high and mighty. I hope nothing catastrophic ever happens to you or yours that will require you to dig into your savings, refinance your house, drop out of college, or delay going to a doctor for an illness because you've lost your family's health insurance along with your job.

I hope nothing happens to me or mine either, but since hope and pixie dust only get you so far, I also save for a rainy day. I am also realistic about the risks I take.

In the end, the responsibility rests on the shoulders of the person who made the decision. I didn't decide to buy a house that got foreclosed on, so why am I shouldered with bailing out the moran that did?

Who chose to work for the company that laid them off? Who chose to go to an expensive college instead of a trade school, only to drop out? Who chose to refinance their house to buy that Escalade that's now worth 40% of what they paid for it? Answer: not me. Not yet. If I have made a poor decision, I should be the one to pay the piper because I am the one that made the decision. That's what freedom is all about.

Soymilk I want to take you along next time I go to the casino so you can subsidize my time at the high roller table. If I win, I get to keep the money, but if I lose, you get to pay me back. Sound good?

Is this a repeat from pre- great depression??? WE ARE SCREWED!

toonz: jaymzz: Yay! My tax dollars go to fund the people who priced me out of the market.

What's the point in voting anymore? It's PMITA either way, but at least we get to choose the lube. Go America!


THIS. I'm so farking pissed off at my fellow leeches, excuse me americans, right now that I may root for N. Korea next round. I don't want them to win but if about half of you farks would just die and stop taking my money I'd be cool with it. you lazy, irresponsible twats.fark you.



I have no problems with this statement. pay for your own shiat.
( I am an ex-pat living in a poor country in europe, I only pay taxes after I break the 90k mark each year.. ) hahahahaha

So I live cheap buy forign land and get more tax breaks.

I'll come back to the states when O'scamo is either out of office or dead of a heart attack.