[airics]

well they are still selling the same home (or trying to) in the development for 269k.. i got my 175k estimate from zillow..

[GailMI]

Originally Posted by gulfer

What I think is a shame that someone can walk away from thier home and still take thier 401K (or what is left of it), savings, etc... and not have to give that up as well. Why isn't a foreclosure looked at like a Bankruptsy? I never understood it and probably never will. I have associates that have done this in the San Diego area. They bought, spent like crazy, re-fied, and now bought another home in a different state only to let the SOCAL home go back to the bank. Just sent them the keys!!! We're all different no doubt, but some kind of obligation should be required!!!

I don't understand this attitude. WHY should honest people lose their entire life savings because they got caught in this crunch? Here's my situation: I bought a condo in Henderson for $133,000 around Sept. 2008. These condos had been selling for about $185,000 a year previously. I thought it was a good deal and the market had bottomed out. I got an FHA loan, my payments are fairly reasonable; HOWEVER these condos are now going for $65,000 to $75,000. I owe $130,000 on my loan. Even after 10 years I will still owe more than the condo is worth. Meanwhile, they are now leasing them and the complex is on the edge of going downhill. Maybe it will, maybe it won't, but I'm not going to live in ghetto conditions in my old age. I am 58 years old. I won't LIVE long enough for this condo to come back to what I owe. What the H***LL am I supposed to do 10 or 15 years down the line if I want to move into a senior complex or something? What if the place slides so far down that I don't feel safe? I have to lose EVERYTHING because I had bad timing? That's ridiculous. The only way I can sleep at night is to tell myself that if it comes down to it, I will walk away. In the meantime, I will pay my mortgage every month, and the bank will get plenty of money, but I'm not going to sacrifice what little savings I have left just because I had bad timing. If I'd bought 1 year later, I'd be on easy street. All this juding from people saying it's criminal, unethical, etc. to walk from a mortgage is ridiculous. Many of us did nothing wrong, we just got stuck.

[airics]

How much is your mortgage payment? 700? You will pay that in rent which is throwing it out the window and trash your credit! Nice!

[GailMI]

Originally Posted by airics

How much is your mortgage payment? 700? You will pay that in rent which is throwing it out the window and trash your credit! Nice!

My mortgage payment is actually $893 right now plus $158 in HOA fees. I figure I'd pay that much in rent, so AS I SAID, I am staying. Plus my payment should go down a little when they adjust for lowering property tax. HOWEVER, I am saying that 10 or 15 years down the road, if my situation changes, if this place has turned totally slum-like, if I feel that I need to be in a different environment, and I feel that I want/need to move, I refuse to feel that I have to spend the rest of my life here just because the market completed it's tank 4 months after I bought. I bought in good faith. I bought under the stipulations that people have always bought: "if you intend to stay in your home for 7-10 years...." But to lose 50% equity in a year is a little bit more than I bargained for. If I am still upside down after faithfully making payments for 10-15 years, yes, I would consider walking. And I don't think that would be unethical. Nobody should have to be owned by a home FOREVER.

[olecapt]

Originally Posted by GailMI

My mortgage payment is actually $893 right now plus $158 in HOA fees. I figure I'd pay that much in rent, so AS I SAID, I am staying. Plus my payment should go down a little when they adjust for lowering property tax. HOWEVER, I am saying that 10 or 15 years down the road, if my situation changes, if this place has turned totally slum-like, if I feel that I need to be in a different environment, and I feel that I want/need to move, I refuse to feel that I have to spend the rest of my life here just because the market completed it's tank 4 months after I bought. I bought in good faith. I bought under the stipulations that people have always bought: "if you intend to stay in your home for 7-10 years...." But to lose 50% equity in a year is a little bit more than I bargained for. If I am still upside down after faithfully making payments for 10-15 years, yes, I would consider walking. And I don't think that would be unethical. Nobody should have to be owned by a home FOREVER.

Push for a loan mod. If no action than push for a short sale. If they ignore you quit paying. Worse that happens is you get most of a year free ride and then get foreclosed. And then you get 90 days and likely key money. If I was 58 I would fix it right now. By the time you are 65 it will all be ancient history. If you were 40 different story. But at 58 you need resolution now and can't afford to wait a few years and then deal with it.

[GailMI]

Originally Posted by olecapt

Push for a loan mod. If no action than push for a short sale. If they ignore you quit paying. Worse that happens is you get most of a year free ride and then get foreclosed. And then you get 90 days and likely key money. If I was 58 I would fix it right now. By the time you are 65 it will all be ancient history. If you were 40 different story. But at 58 you need resolution now and can't afford to wait a few years and then deal with it.

Olecapt: can you advise me as to how to do this? Can I try to PM you (not sure how to do that)? To tell you the truth, I'm scared to death when I think about this, so most of the time I try to put it out of mind. If there's some way for me to fix this now, my grasp on sanity would probably be less tenuous.

[geos]

Originally Posted by olecapt

Push for a loan mod. If no action than push for a short sale. If they ignore you quit paying. Worse that happens is you get most of a year free ride and then get foreclosed. And then you get 90 days and likely key money. If I was 58 I would fix it right now. By the time you are 65 it will all be ancient history. If you were 40 different story. But at 58 you need resolution now and can't afford to wait a few years and then deal with it.

Well, I have to say that is great advice. Gail, listen to OC and screw the finger waggers. Banks don't understand the concept of "moral obligation"; why should you when dealing with them?

[jlawrence01]

Originally Posted by GailMI

I don't understand this attitude. WHY should honest people lose their entire life savings because they got caught in this crunch? Here's my situation: I bought a condo in Henderson for $133,000 around Sept. 2008. .

Why should the people that lent you the money in good faith lose THEIR money due to YOUR mistake?

[GailMI]

Originally Posted by jlawrence01

Why should the people that lent you the money in good faith lose THEIR money due to YOUR mistake?

It wasn't MY mistake. It was MY bad luck. Geez...you people are really harsh, aren't you? You telling me that anybody who bought too early in the housing slide was stupid/wrong/bad and anybody who bought at exactly the right time is smart/right/good? My lease was up, the market seemed good, almost EVERYBODY was saying "now's the time to buy" and I did. Now my financial life has to be ruined to save some rich banker's ass? That's a pretty warped view of the world. Are you a banker?

[jfkIII]

Real Estate, like any other investment, is a gamble. You played, and you lost. Yep, bad luck. Sometimes that happens to me at a craps table, when it gets cold. And when it does, I never think to go to the casino bosses and ask them to give me some of my money back. I also never think to ask the winners (who played it right) to bail me out with some of their winnings.