This is a stupid question , however what do people do who lose their homes ?

[blues90]

As it seems to be happening all over the country now . If you lose your house now your credit has gone to hell and since good credit is required to even rent a truck let alone get an apartment even if you have a good job or at least can make the rent .

I have no house to lose but I do worry alotr about just making the rent and have no credit , mine went down the toilet during the 90's when work got so slow I could not make the payments .

I went to one of those places that figured out you basic bills and made offers to pay the credit cards but the calls never stopped and they laughted at me saying there is no way they will take less than min payments , so that didn't work out and I lostr all my hope of credit .

Not having good credit I found even affected getting a job in many cases .

[EST]

1. Well, I lived in an old van, that I had traded for, for a time.

Staying clean was always a problem and learning to shave in ice cold water on a seventeen degree day was a lesson in efficiency.

I had a fallback plan that took most of the winter to complete and I had to crash on a few friendly couches, for a time.
Fortunately, there were no children involved. Don't know what I would have done in that case.

[shanti]

4. one of my sons

was homeless for a period of time, and lived out of his truck. luckily, he had joined a health club earlier and used it to shower, etc. i suppose it could be done, but it wouldn't be much fun!

[shadowrider]

2. Credit reports shouldn't be required

For employment UNLESS the job involves dealing with money.

[Tesha]

30. Credit reports are commonly acquired for any number of jobs.

Your credit report is a pretty good indication of
whether or not you'll be a reliable employee.

Tesha

[OzarkDem]

33. Pretty standard these days

as you say, regardless of the type of job. Many younger recovering cancer patients who were uninsured and had to declare bankruptcy are put in that position when they finish treatment and try to find a new job. Employers find out why you filed for bankruptcy and they won't hire you for fear you'll cause their health insurance costs to go up.

[Mutineer]

36. There's no way I'd hire anyone without pulling their credit report

I also do criminal background checks on employees. It's saved me a lot of headache and heartache.

[AzDar]

3. I would imagine that most people would pick up and split BEFORE

their home is actually sold out from under them.
There is usually a 3-4 month lag in credit reporting, so the REALLY bad stuff wouldn't be on the report until 3-4 months after the sale.
It would suck indeed, but hopefully peeps are getting a bit of a jump on it, so they aren't out on the tiles.

[Snarkoleptic]

6. Unfortunately, mortagage delinquency is a progression

from 30 to 60 to 90 to 120 days in default.
The credit bureaus may be only 3-4 weeks behind in reporting a delinquency.
The important thing for a past-due homeowner to do is to stay in touch with their lender.
If the lender hears nothing from a past-due borrower, they'll assume the worst and file foreclosure more quickly.
Past due borrowers who keep in countact and express interest in keeping the home can usually get a 'forebearance agreement'.
The banks don't want to foreclose (especially in the current market) and will work to establish a payment plan.
Of course, with the current Bushco economy, it's tough to afford the regular payment let alone a forebearnace (catch-up) payment-and-a-quarter per month.
In short, keep in touch and let the lender know that you care...otherwise they'll assume you are indifferent.

[The Vinyl Ripper]

8. Let's see...

Home is going into foreclosure anyway and you know it..

You stop paying mortgage payments, what's the point?

Save money not paid for mortgage.

When you finally get evicted, you at least have a little money.

That is the way I would do it.

[EST]

9. It wouldn't bother you that you'd be stealing from someone else?

[The Vinyl Ripper]

11. Let's see...

Steal from greedy corporation?

Go homeless with my kids?

Decisions, decisions..

What's a parent to do?

[EST]

13. Stealing is still stealing, no matter who or what.

Even if it's a greedy corporation that owns something, it is your character and integrity that are developed and put on display, not theirs.

In my world it's always people before things, and if it comes to a choice between property rights or time and saving a life, the life wins out every time.
If I had to rip somebody off to feed the children, then the obligation shifts to me to make it right and to do whatever it takes not to have to be in that position again. Stealing from them again does not represent providing for the helpless dependents any more; it represents the greed and lack of self respect of the thief, not the supposedly greedy corp he's stealing from.

Making someone else the victim of one's own avarice, shoddy scruples and underdeveloped ethics shows one to be even worse than whatever one thinks of his victim.
A shameful way to live.

[The Vinyl Ripper]

15. I really and truly hope you never have a serious illness..

Then you might be put in the situation of survival or stealing.

Go without food for three or four days and get back to me.

[EST]

19. Heheh!

How little you know for the amount you assume.
I've had a few pieces of my body shot away, still surviving a crippling disease and, with the help of an absolutely amazing array of medicines, am currently disabled and near quadriplegic, hoping to wrestle a terminal illness for a couple more years to yet make a difference in the world.
I have provided food, shelter and a warm place to sleep to more folks than I would have thought possible and fewer than I wish I had.

I have been poor as the proverbial church mouse, sleeping in the back of a pickup truck and being glad for a little spot out of the rain and I have been well enough off to buy pretty much whatever I wanted without fear of shortages.

And I have never, ever allowed my dislike or disgust for someone to be an excuse for making myself just another thieving, disgusting cancer on humanity, nor have I pretended that I was a such a victim that I was not responsible for myself or my actions.

[Lasher]

20. Sorry for your troubles past and present.

You seem a brave and charitable person and I admire your character.

I hope your health improves. :hi:

[EST]

22. Thank you for your kind thoughts.

I am a little embarrassed-I did not mean to attract attention for anything about me, merely to point out to the poster, whose respect for others needs a bit of tuning, that judging other people based on a fact free picture in your own mind is probably not a really effective way to get through life.
Thanks again for space in your mind. Things are pretty cool and there are some new medicines in the pipeline that may show some promise.

[The Vinyl Ripper]

23. Ahh...

But you weren't watching your children go hungry..

And we spent three months in a tent with a three year old child..

You speak of not judging others and judge me so harshly?

You know as much about me as I know about you.

[JNelson6563]

26. Ah, no kids, that s'plains it

Imagine a kid or two in the mix and having to provide for them in the situation you were in.

A lot different.

Julie

[JNelson6563]

25. Are you familiar with "desperation"?

Your words make it seem as though desperation were a foreign concept to you.

Julie

[snappyturtle]

10. Unfortunately, rent isn't cheap either.......even if you can somehow

get past the credit check coming up with first and last month's rent and security deposit can be a lot. My daughter just went through this. Through a loss of one job (attrition) and the other not sufficient to pay her mortgage she luckily rented her home out (year lease)furnished(!) and moved out with a bed, two cats and some dishes into sharing an apartment with two others....not ideal but she made it by the skin of her teeth. Then she got the first and last month's rent from her renter her bank, Wells Fargo, put a hold on her account! Froze it for 15 days! BECAUSE she deposited more than she normally did! I paid her mortgage and when her account becomes unfrozen we'll be paid back.....but........I had to pay her mortgage company directly because had I mailed her a check they would have probably frozen it too. Her mortgage company has been basically satisfied but except for an additional 150 dollars per month for 4 months.....sorry to burden you all with this...it has been a difficult period. This is a hard working (70 hours per week) college grad who didn't deserve this. She did do what you say....quit with the mortgage paid everything else...she's down to nothing but relieved. Hopefully, she can sell while she has a built in renter to an investor.....or if she gets a better job she can look forward to moving back into her home.

I can't tell you how I hate even thinking about her in her present situation since she's always worked so hard. She and I got her through college with no debt. I can't sleep unless I take some sleepy time stuff....but I know she'll be OK. Just a note: she rented her 1600 dollar a month condo and found her 500 dollar a month apartment space all through craigslist.com....she told her "landlord", another condo owner probably "in trouble", her situation to avoid what would have been a credit check with a management company. Maybe, tonight I can sleep....she moved out last weekend and is finally settled.

[The Vinyl Ripper]

18. Rent is considerably higher in our area than our mortgage is.

Sorry to hear of your daughter's troubles.

So often bad things happen to good people.

We have taken my wife's sister in three times over the last twenty years. The last time she had an infant. Our home is only about a thousand square feet with three small bedrooms but I would let my family all live here rather than see them on the street. My brother and his wife, my daughter, her husband, my three grandchildren and my sister in law and her son.

If that's what it takes, I'll do it.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

5. It Would Suck....

eom

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

7. folks around here house sit

We have a lot of summer homes around here, and so many can house sit during the winter. In the summer, it is easier to camp out, or live in one of the shelter bluff caves. I know one woman who had an arrangement with an old fellow who'd just had a stroke. In exchange for a place to sleep and food, she looked after him--cleaned the house,cooked meals, made sure he took his meds, drove him to PT, etc. She didn't get paid, but she was able to live.

[MountainLaurel]

12. Move in with parents, or children

Or crash at one friend's house or another.

[Lasher]

21. I'll bet lots of folks are moving in with family.

Friends can grow weary of having you there when you're not helping with expenses. Hopefully your family won't.

[MountainLaurel]

29. Perhaps

I think it may be worse with family, though, especially when there wasn't a healthy relationship to begin with. I know someone in this position for whom it's been really hard, because there is a lot of "You fucked up, and we have to save your ass again" recriminations. (This is a person who has been getting "you can't do anything right" from his parents since he was a boy, and became a self-fulfilling prophecy.) At least friends genuinely want you around.

[w8liftinglady]

14. I lost my house.

I live with my boyfriend,who is now more like my room mate.There are tons of "share" ads on Craigslist.Check it out.

[OzarkDem]

34. This is becoming more of a trend

With wages falling or stagnant and costs of housing, utilities, gas, etc. rising, more people are sharing apartments, homes, etc.

Two can live much more cheaply than one.

[JVS]

16. rent

[Lone_Star_Dem]

17. Good luck getting in someplace

The credit check is a killer.

I think there's going to be a growing community that lives "in a van down by the river."

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

24. Many poor people live in motels

some fairly nice, some not so nice. And it's not like these motels are exactly cheap either. But, at least a person wouldn't have to worry about utilities, tv, phone in room, etc.

Now, because of course it's de rigeur to kick people when they're down, I have heard of communities that have passed lodging laws that don't allow people to stay more than 30 consecutive days. I do understand is that there is a difference between temporary lodging and apartments and that's what these laws are designed to address. What kills me is that there is never an attempt to address the underlying issue- affordable housing and decent wages.

We are building a permanent underclass in our society. They have no money for college and the service industries they work in at their 2 and 3 jobs combined do not pay enough for them to have a decent roof over their heads and food and gas. Older societies did a better of than we do currently. Not so long ago there were many many boarding houses in all of our cities - "room and board" remember that term? Also, YMCAs and YWCAs also had dormstyle living for single occupancies. The whole concept of "single occupancy" has gone away even though there are still single people, young and old, who are not coupled or part of a family who need shelter. (I know all about discrimination against children and families and Fair Housing Laws and why there are no longer swinging singles apartment developments - that's really not what I am talking about here)

I have often thought that there are complimentary needs that could be met with some REAL thinking and planning in our planning and zoning boards. There are many elderly people who would love to age in place, but they have a hard time getting out to the store because they don't drive anymore and they end up being forced out of their homes and going into "assisted living" even though that isn't really their first choice. These folks could put accessory apartments or in-law apartments in their houses or build efficiency apartments over their garages where they could charge a reasonable rent in exchange for some help in their living situation. Bingo! affordable housing for some and aging in place for others. But people would somehow scream about such a humanitarian concept, I am sure, and think of some way that such a thing would destroy their neighborhood or drive down property values or some such rot.

When I was in college, long ago, I lived by myself in a wonderful efficiency apartment. I had a large single room (and it was LARGE) that had room for both a living area with a couch and a sleeping area that I boxed in with bookshelves for privacy - it also had a fairly decent sized kitchen with a table and chairs and a perfectly fine bathroom. I paid $112 a month which included cable for the TV. I loved my little place and was perfectly content there. I don't know, but I would bet that that little complex of efficiency apartments is gone now and replaced with something much more upscale and expensive.

Our biggest problem in our society is that somehow we have made "poor" equate with "evil" "bad" "lazy", etc. and don't give credit that often "poor" could more equate with "ill" "elderly" "bankrupt" or just plain "unlucky". Raise wages, fund healthcare for all, build affordable housing and then watch an American Renaissance.

[JTFrog]

27. I'm not going to tell my story here, but I will

tell the story of a family that I met along the way. A family of six. The father worked for greyhound and made livable wages. However, their youngest daughter had a heart condition. Her medical bills overwhelmed them. They lost their house. When I met them, we were in a Los Angeles campground. They had a small trailer attached to a truck. At the time, the campground fees were about $5 per night. The park rangers would come by once a week to collect from the locked cement box they had posted. Well, sometimes they'd have the money and sometimes they wouldn't. They wrote a lot of checks and put them in those boxes. I don't think many if any of them cleared. But I cannot in any way find it in my heart to call this family thieves. Their little girl had a hole in her chest that was covered with a large bandage. It couldn't be closed up because of the procedures they did on her several times a week. The risks that this child had to face everyday because her parents couldn't afford to keep up was more than appalling. The mother often spent days at a time at emergency rooms with the child. The father never missed work if you can imagine how hard this was. No showers, no electricity, outhouse on a hill. They'd sometimes park outside of the KOA campgrounds and walk in and use the showers there. I can't really go on more about this story because reliving it is hard. Suffice it to say that people do what they can. Of the people that I met, this was one of the more fortunate families. It is extremely sad to know that people have to exist like this in this country.

[Greyhound]

28. Thanks for posting this story. Thanks to our media's conscious decision to ignore it

most of the sheeple are completely unaware that there are millions of Americans living in conditions as bad, if not worse, than what we saw in the Great Depression.

This has been going on for over 25 years and each time it comes up it is quickly spiked. There have been stories written about the "communities" of homeless living outside of every major population center, and the "hidden homeless" living and working, sometimes for years, out of their cars.

It seems the bottom line is that the sheeple are just not willing to look at the price some have to pay to maintain the "American" lifestyle.

[yardwork]

31. Yes, it really makes me angry.

I see the posts even here on DU sometimes with the lies. "Socialized medicine" will mean that we can't choose our doctors! Doctors and nurses will have to take 200% pay cuts if we have universal healthcare! Michael Moore says that Cuba has better healthcare and that's a lie! We'll have to wait in line for weeks to get medical care! I know someone who's brother's cousin's sister-in-law left France because the healthcare was so bad! The sky is falling! Eeek!

I get so mad.

[BlooInBloo]

32. Get apartments?

[Rosemary2205]

35. I came pretty close to losing my home.

There are people losing homes based on a radical change in financial status or severe medical problems and for those people I have incredible empathy. I've been in my house over 20 years, made a 20% downpayment when we bought it and bought a much lower priced home than the bank claimed we qualified for at the time. My home is under 900sq ft on "the wrong side" of metro Atlanta.

In 2000 my husband and I were run off the highway by a drunk and plummetted over 50ft over the edge. We were both disabled forever. My husband has a good strong body but his brain is no longer reliable. My brains work OK but I am now in a wheelchair full time. My husband cannot ever go back to work and I was out of work for just over 4 years.

I don't know what would have happened to us if it were not for my dear sister and her husband and kids. They moved out of their rented home and into mine and basically took it over. They paid my mortgage and all my home bills. They made sure we got the medical care we needed. They saved us. She said it worked out great for them because our old mortgage was so cheap that they saved enough to buy their own home AND my sister was able to stop working for 5 years and take care of me and the husband during our rehab period and raise her kids during those demanding teen years.


To those people in America losing an expensive home bought on risky loans out of pure greed thinking they would make a killing I say fuck you for putting your family at risk. But for those who were careful and are getting screwed anyway because of job loss or illness, you all have my complete and total empathy. Most people out there don't have the luck I did with my sister to come help.