HEY YOU! I GOT ME SOME RIGHTS TOO!

If a renter is in a property that has been foreclosed on they should be given time.  If the person who purchased the property is going to move in and make it a home they should make a fair agreement with the current renter.  If the banks bought the home back at Sheriff sale and is just going to remarket it then by law the renter should be allowed to stay in the home unitl the lease is up. 

ON ANOTHER NOTE...

My experience over the last several months has been that most homeowners who are upside down and sideways on their mortgages continue to pay on them. Forget the reports that people are walking away from their homes in droves. At least in Las Vegas it’s just not happening. 

Most people have pride and they want to do the right thing and pay their bills.  In his paper  "Underwater and Not Walking Away: Shame, Fear and the Social Management of the Housing Crisis” Brent T. White, University of Arizona Law Professor, talks about people having a dramatically overblown perception of the consequences they may suffer from foreclosure. 

Mister White suggests that the government and other social control agencies like the media and the church actively try and to shame homeowners into following the straight and narrow path of living up to their financial obligations and to ignore the reality of the market forces.

Say you are upside down 200 thousand dollars on your mortgage and you are middle-aged, like somewhere between 45 and 55 – what are the chances of every recovering that loss on your property?  Should you stay in the home and pay for years and years on a toxic asset?  If you were a business would you be expected to do this, or would you file Chapter 11 and try and reorganize your company?  Would the world snicker? 

In business as in life sometimes we are forced to make hard choices. If walking away from a home becomes the best financial decision should a homeowner be held to a different standard then the lender?   

These insidious rules of morality that echo in people’s minds are there to try and sway the homeowner into doing the right thing by paying their mortgage no matter what.  Isn’t this a double standard?  Shouldn’t the same rules of morality apply to the lender? They don’t. 

 The lender looks to maximize profits or minimize losses irrespective of concerns of morality or social responsibility.  The lender gets bailed out by the government.  The lender moves the note and deed through financial institutions like MERS at will.  The lender can sell your property for ten cents on the dollar, write it off and then get paid off through their insurance carrier for their losses. 

Why is there such a divide between the moral obligations of homeowners and the moral obligations of lenders? This imbalance creates an inequality between the lender and the homeowner. 

We had a housing collapse in this country.  We are experiencing a financial melt-down that has not been seen since the Great Depression in the 1930’s.  The government has promised to step in and help people.  The President announced last week that he would hold the lenders feet to the fire to work out agreement with homeowners to do loan modifications. 

The banks keep on foreclosing on people.  I deal with the banks all the time over loan modifications and short sales and they cheat and lie like it’s a sport.  Meanwhile homeowners are expected to shoulder the burden of the housing bust – be good citizens – forget about retirement and keep paying on their homes that hangs like an albatross around their necks. Folks, it's time for a break.  Talk is cheap. The banks have to be held accountable to the public they were supposed to serve.