Bernanke: "...We're ****ed"

Wow, I pay my mortgage on time. I think they should buy me out.

You people are idiots. They’re buying the paper from the banks so these massive financial companies don’t collapse. They’re not forgiving the debt, but the gov’t can work w/ the individuals much easier than the bank can. This move will actually allow a lot more people to work out terms to pay off the debt.

I like how people blame the consumer in this situation. It is without a doubt the banks fault. They didn’t do proper due diligence.

i dont think some people really understand what the fed is doing and why.

:tup: for clarification. i was about to type a long winded version of what you just said, and you saved me.

So they are helping big business.

I’m surprised that JayS & AWD missed it… :mamoru:

But the consumer did???

:implode:

yes.

I get why they are doing it. That’s not a problem.

It’s the fact that they have to do it in the first place that is the problem. Same reasons sunny may and freddie programs were being investigated. Just giving it out without regard in hopes of bolstering the housing boom and their own figures…and eventual collapse.

Thats what i said without being a meanie.

I have no problem with low and no down payment plans. What I have a problem with is how much they’ll lend people. When the wife and I bought we were only making about 65-70 combined and they pre-approved us for something like 240. That was WAY more than we could afford in monthly payments though.

But in the end who’s fault is it when people take out these loans they can’t pay back? I guess we have to put some blame on the banking industry, since they’ve gone and fucked up the entire economy, but the majority of the blame lies with stupid buyers.

We don’t expect car dealers to stop people from buying more car than they can afford, or electronics dealers to stop people from buying more TV than they can afford, so we sure as hell should expect people to think about their budget when making the single biggest purchase of their life.

How we fix it now I don’t know. We definitely shouldn’t be spending tax dollars to keep people in houses they should never have bought in the first place though. That’s just another plan of taxing smart people to benefit stupid ones. Maybe foreclose on the homes and use some tax money to help the bank with SOME of the difference between what the mortgage was taken out for and what the house is worth now that the bubble popped. The moron who bought twice as much house as he could afford just better not be allowed to keep the house if you’re going to make taxpayers pay for his mistake though.

And Nick, I did understand what they were doing, my first response was just a joke.

You’re already paying for it in inflation & $ value.

Are you serious? Give me a break. The banks took a huge gamble on home prices, figuring even if the fuckers couldn’t pay back the mortgage they’d be able to sell the house and come out ahead.

You can only default on the amount the lender is willing to give you. If I give JEG $1,000,000 at 0% for 2 years and 20% after that when he can’t pay me my interest who would you be laughing at? Me, b/c I was dumb enough to think he’d be able to pay it back.

In the end the fault lies on the one who stamped “APPROVED”…there’s a saying “You can only lose what you put out there”

Fine, but regardless, he doesn’t get the house. We can’t keep rewarding these stupid people. Kick him out, make him live in a cheap apartment for the next few years while he figures out how to buy a house he can afford this time. I don’t even care if this plan cost taxpayers more, as long as the end result isn’t rewarding more people for their stupidity.

And when Joe said it wasn’t the individual’s fault it was the banks I went looking for a lawyer to kick in the balls because that’s just what’s wrong with this country. No one is ever responsible for their own mistakes.

all of this is well and good.

a couple of key points:

  1. as much as we would like to, we can’t go back and cram personal financial educations in to the peoples heads that apparently had a profound lacking.

  2. as much as we would like to, we can’t go back and force lenders to be more thorough in educating individual consumers on their lending vehicles, and require them to lend more conservatively.

  3. all we can do is deal with what has become reality: recession.

ok, once you except what is going on, you can take the steps to identify what is prohibiting improvement. only once you identify what is still snagging the economy can you attempt to fix it.

the fed issuing debt to purchase bundled loans may seem like robbing peter to pay paul, but at this point it is a necessary evil that could free up the current massive traffic jam.

same here, me and my fiance were approved 2.5 years ago for $220k loan, when combined we were making about $75k combined. and I work for a mtg company and knew the loan officer who said this. i looked at her with disgust and said “i’ll stick to $100k kthxbye”

she tried to convince us we could afford it even though when all other bills were paid at that time, we had little left over after our current payment.

:nono:

Okay, so now you have an extra few MILLION homes on the market, furthur crippling the real estate prices… enabling the current problem.

It WAS the bank’s mistake! They took a massive risk on the economy and home values. They lost.

Don’t they have insurance for that?

Yeah, except that all these people you kicked out of their homes are now looking to buy again. Maybe they can’t afford to buy the same house, but they can buy something they can afford and the guy selling the house they can afford can buy their old place now that it’s actually valued properly.

both of these statements are wide sweeping generalizations that show no sense of understanding of the other point of view.

it isnt as simple as “oh no! the evil nasty banks gambled, lent money recklessly, and lost! it is all their fault!!!111!11”

nor is it as simple as “everyone is stupid, it is all the stupid people buying shit they can’t afford that pushed us into recession!!!1!1!”

life is shades of gray. obviously there are multiple factors. instead of sitting around and finger pointing, we should discuss what will get us out of this mess. however, in a rational world, we should all agree that there were a number of factors that led to this. let’s just call it contributory negligence on all sides.