In 2006, I was single and had lived in apartments my entire adult life. My lease was up at my current apartment and I was influenced by a number of people to by a home. I was making $32,500 a year as a program manager for an adolescent drug rehab facility. I had no savings for a down payment. I was finally convinced by a friend who had been in the mortgage industry that this was a great investment and as a first new home buyer, I could qualify. I did qualify for $175,000. I knew that there was no way I would ever afford the payments, so accepted $100,000. No balloon. 2 months later in August 2006, I found out I was pregnant. I knew that my one bedroom condo would not be sufficient. I waited one year and put the condo on the market and by that time, the market had crashed. My $100,000 single bedroom condo is unsellable and now in 2009, it is worth $72,000. Married and with a toddler, we all live in a 1 bedroom condo. We make $85,000 a year and to walk away would kill our credit.

We are responsible Americans who are victims of this greed. I have a toddler who runs into walls because we can’t leave. When I worked in rehab I used to work for extra money at a friend’s mortgage company. I purged files. In 2002, I asked him how he could justify giving a family who makes less than $75,000 a year a loan for $300,000 dollars. His response was this, “It’s not my home to lose.” I saw the greed then. Why didn’t Washington? It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that the market would crash. Please help this country. We are in trouble and greed and apathy will be our death.