Eight million people are at risk of losing their homes because Wall Street abandoned responsible lending practices to gain short-term profits. The housing crisis is not just a problem for families facing foreclosure - it's a problem for every homeowner in America. As long as foreclosures persist, home values will keep going down, and everyone loses.
We need your help. Have you been affected by the housing meltdown? Foreclosed on? Underwater? Record your story, or the story of a friend, family member, or neighbor, and send it to us. You can also add your written story along with a photo for the map. Then, watch the video stories of the families, mothers, fathers, and children who have lost, or are losing the place they call home.
If you’re a Wall Street executive who drove your firm into the ground and nearly capsized the U.S. economy, it seems like all you have to do these days to get a multibillion dollar bailout from Congress is put your hand out.
But if you’re like Guillermo San Pedro, a hardworking truck driver in Los Angeles who fell victim to a predatory loan and is at risk of losing his home, you’re on your own.
Eight million people are at risk of losing their homes because Wall Street abandoned responsible lending practices to gain short-term profits. The housing crisis is not just a problem for families facing foreclosure - it’s a problem for every homeowner in America. As long as foreclosures persist, home values will keep going down, and everyone loses. No Wall Street bailout will fix that problem.
We’re collecting stories from people all over the country who have been hit by the housing crisis so we can show what’s really happening on Main Street: while Wall Street takes hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer money to pay for lavish executive bonuses and luxurious office furniture, homeowners at risk of foreclosure still aren’t getting any relief.
We need your help. Have you been affected by the housing meltdown? Foreclosed on? Underwater? Trapped in a predatory loan? Do you know anyone else whose life has been turned upside down by the collapse of the real estate market? Record your story, or the story of a friend, family member, co-worker, or neighbor, and send it to us. If you have a video camera or webcam, then please send us your video. You can also add your written story along with a photo we can post on our interactive map.
We have already heard too much from bailed out banks. Their corporate greed clearly knows no bounds as they continue predatory lending practices after taking tens of billions from the government, which they failed to use to jump-start economic recovery. And now we’ve heard from Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, who rolled out his controversial Financial Stabilization Plan today that will devote $50 billion to help dam up the flood of foreclosures drowning our economy. Who have we not heard from?
How about the 2.3 million Americans who faced foreclosure proceedings last year? How about the 860,000 people whose homes were repossessed by lenders? How about the millions more out there right now struggling to renegotiate their mortgages with banks bent on reducing lending, restricting loans, and lying about conditions? Those are the heartrending stories we haven’t heard yet, but that’s about to change.
Today, Brave New Foundation is unveiling its newest campaign: Fighting for Our Homes. The website enables anyone affected by the housing crisis to tell their tale in their own words, either by recording it on camera or writing it down and submitting it with a photo of the house in jeopardy. Watch as people from around the country give accounts of their nightmarish ordeals. These stories fill up an interactive Google map symbolizing the toll this economic meltdown has taken on Main Street homeowners, reminding us of the consequences of irresponsible lending and corporate malfeasance.
Tired of the dumbed-down public debate about the stimulus package? Progressive economist Dean Baker offers a bracing take on the underlying housing bubble, why the stimulus package is a good start but not enough to kick start the economy, and why things are likely to get worse before they get better.
Sen. John Kerry is on fire. First, he drew the connection between the Vietnam War and the current quagmire in Afghanistan during Secrtary of State Clinton’s confirmation hearing. Now, he’s taking on the Republicans on the Senate floor, chastising the GOP and the Bush administration for creating the housing crisis.
“For nine months,” Kerry said, “they sat there while 10,000 homes a day were being foreclosed, and they allowed us to slide into where we are today.” So much for the Republicans’ ridiculous claims that a lack of housing relief was their chief concern with the stimulus.
The reporters covering the stimulus have been so busy editorializing against it that they haven’t had time to pay attention to what Congress is doing. Last night Congress approved the Isakson amendment which gives $15,000 (or 10 percent of the purchase price, whichever is lower) to every person who buys a home in 2009.
Somehow, Isakson puts the cost of his tax break at just $19 billion. Let’s break the Washington rules and try a little arithmetic. Even with weakness in the housing market, it is still virtually certain that we will sell close to 5 million homes in 2009. The overwhelming majority would qualify for the full credit. So, we get 5 million times $15,000. That sounds a lot like $75 billion.
The GOP and Fox News have been ganging up on the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) like a couple of bullies picking on the scrawniest kid in the schoolyard–and they can only push that kid so far until he gives them a well-deserved bloody nose. Last week, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) unjustly accused ACORN of receiving a $4.19 billion bailout from President Obama’s economic stimulus package. His false claims were echoed by Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) on Fox, who claimed this money was a “payoff” for ACORN’s activism in the last election. That was all it took for bloviators Rush Limbaugh and Michelle Malkin to resuscitate allegations of ACORN’s voter fraud. They even blamed the low- and moderate-income advocacy group for the subprime meltdown, rather than discuss the banks actually caused this mess and have subsequently received tens of billions in bailout funds they continue to squander.
These cries amount to nothing more than fearmongering in the name of obstructionism, what ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis called “a complete fabrication of overheated partisan fever dreams.” As Congress Matters noted, the $4.19 billion was actually set aside for “neighborhood stabilization activities related to emergency assistance for the redevelopment of abandoned and foreclosed homes.” In other words, any non-profit housing developer could bid on this money.
Here comes the bloody nose. Yesterday, the organization sent a letter to Boehner’s office and media in Ohio shooting down each and every accusation and attacking Boehner on his home turf, a district where more than 4,800 families faced foreclosure in 2008 alone. They also went after Boehner’s record of voting against the Foreclosure Prevention Act of 2008 and the Mortgage Reform and Anti-Predatory Lending Act. Simultaneously, they’re asking everyone to contact their Senators and tell them to support the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, a version of which passed in the House last week despite the GOP’s partisan rancor.
