How did I ever get here? So here I am a young wife and mother living the American Dream and life is great. I have a decent job, beautiful family, and our faithful family dog. I can’t explain the feeling I get inside when I pull up to my new home, if it’s gratification, accomplishment, or peace. Life couldn’t be better for me, right? Actually today, it just became a lot worse. I found out my spouse’s boss reads the same newspaper as the rest of America and decided it is time to “re-evaluate” the direction business was going and needed to “downsize”. Also in that same newspaper it mentioned how the entire state was potentially entering into a recession and my husbands’ company wasn’t the only one downsizing, in fact, it was downright scary to see how many were. To make it worse, I found out that not only were there thousands of existing foreclosures on the market but several thousand more foreclosures due to hit the market in the very, very near future! With all of these foreclosures being sold for pennies on the dollar I knew that I was in for a bumpy ride. I am in a 100% loan with no real equity, in fact I approached then passed what I owed and now owe even more on my home than its market value? Am I what they are calling “underwater” or “upside down”? HOW DID I EVER GET HERE? I am not alone my neighbors, my friends, my co-workers all ended up here! My first instinct was to blame the economy, the decision makers of the world, and my husband for getting me into this whole mess. I want to blame everyone involved with suckering me into this SCAM! After spending many nights without sleep or wasted time at work analyzing this in more depth, I realize what a mess we have all gotten into. It’s not just me, it’s everyone and how did we all get here? Who is allowing these zeros down and interest only loans, and loans that adjust after two years and consumers aren’t even aware that they will at all? I guess I’ve come to realize it’s not so much just anyone person or groups fault, it is the greed of all the people to make unjust decisions. The greed of Wall Street convincing people that such pools, “secured backed mortgages”, lower the risk on many of these types of loans were ok. As the assets just kept going up in value and it was just a “normal” business risk. Mortgage brokers whose actions of bending the rules and made fraudulent claims and documentations to qualify people who shouldn’t have qualified. Or when a mortgage broker would tell someone to take out a line of credit for now and just refinance it in the future to get out of it? Many mortgage brokers appraiser’s purposely over appraised the value of many homes to fabricate they put 20% down that they didn’t! Or the title company who pushed it through and didn’t record the note? Or all of us that are being tempted with having a bigger and better house, bigger and better cars and more credit card debt than we could really afford. Who wouldn’t take the credit when everyone is throwing it at you? Get stuff now, pay later. I hear stories of how it was almost a sin to owe money to anyone back in my grandmas’ day. You never would owe money to anyone, and if you did, it was your first priority to pay it back. Now none of us have one leg to stand on and won’t have money to ever put down on a house or anything for that matter because we owe it all out to our debtors for money we borrowed and never even held in our hands. The last thing I want to do is play the blame game because it will get me nowhere fast. (Like my mortgage) I am in this position, and I need to start with myself. I am realizing my MTv, CRIBS, attitude is what got me here. I don’t need a home that is ahead of my time, career and budget, a car I can’t pay for, to max out my credit cards to buy clothes of a certain brand, or put on a “show” to compete with my peers. I need to buckle down and find out what to do for my home so I can move on. I need to learn from these mistakes that got me here and be strong enough to pick up the pieces and progress. The American Dream is not dead, our future is not dead. We can and have survived. Just as the survivors of the depression survived and passed on their lessons from their hardships, so will we. I will educate my child on all of our mistakes so she will not do the same, so she will be stronger than I was and carry that on. She will save and not borrow, buy and not lease and not be moved by certain fads that will alter her beliefs. This storm will pass, not today, tomorrow or next week, but it is on the horizon. So now that I know how got here, I will climb out, and I don’t ever want to come back