It is well known that the vast majority of hardened criminals do not start out with severe crimes.  They start out with very small crimes and when they discover that they can get away with them, they move on up from there.  Many of the criminals of tomorrow, though, will be of a completely different start.

The simple fact of being foreclosed on has turned out the worst in people .  Say you have a car that you want to sell, and someone comes up to you to buy it.  The buyer only can put a small deposit down on the car, so you agree to let him pay you monthly for the rest.  After some time, he stops paying you monthly.  You keep asking for payment, but he does not give it to you.  After a year and a half, you demand your car back.  He takes a sledge hammer and smashes it to pieces.  Wouldn't you be a bit perturbed.

Yet this is exactly what is happening now.  People who simply made bad financial mistakes take absolutely no responsibility for it themselves.  They blame the banks entirely and proceed to trash the property.  Some of them even return to the properties while they are on the market and do more damage.

In one particular case, the previous owner complained that her appliances were expensive and that it wasn't fair to leave them to the bank.  On behalf of the bank, I arranged for cash for keys to buy the appliances at brand new prices and the owner agreed.  Shortly after the transaction and after the property had new locks, she broke into the property and stole the appliances and ripped the doors out.

What this person did constitutes theft.  I called the police and took all the necessary steps. Now, she has several children who live with her.  What lesson did she just teach them?  These children now believe that theft can be justified.

Thefts like this are becoming more and more common.  In one case where someone broke into the home and stole all of the faucets and light fixtures (the day before inspection) I called the police and the response was that they could not due anything due to 'humanity laws' concerning the previous homeowner.  In this case, I believe it was someone other than the previous owner but still was quite upset that the police considered it a non-issue.

These people committing these crimes will not stop here.  They now fully believe they can act with impunity.  They can take a loan out for something they cannot pay, get away with not paying for over a year, then trash it without repercussions.  They can then continue to break into that property and steal with impunity.  Do you really think they won't translate that to other crimes?

Yet the public sympathy continues to be on the side of the poor homeowners being booted out by the evil banks after living in the house rent free for over a year.  Certainly the banks can be faulted for giving out loans that should never have been given and then investing these funds in poor places, but that argument is akin to me giving you a gun, you shooting someone, then blaming it on me.