[thechat] Hiding from Elections Now

[Luther, Ron]

erik mattheis noted:

>>Everyone agrees that the bad mortgages at the bottom of the current crisis were ... blah


Hi Erik,

Actually, I don't agree.  I think the bad mortgages were made by sales bunnies looking to beat their quotas by offering inappropriate loan instruments to their customers.  Mistakes?  Errors?  Oversights?  Fraud?  Deceptive paperwork?  Nope.  None of the above.  They knew the rules.  They worked within the rules.  They knew what would pass.  I feel it was quite deliberate.

>>"predatory lending" is a criminal activity where a "predatory
>>lender" intentionally gets someone into a mortgage they can't
>>afford and immediately sells the mortgage to someone else ...

Meh.  I disagree again.  I'm pretty sure the letter of the law you are referencing here deals with using *deceptive practices* to get the customer signature on the loan application.  I don't think it has a damn thing to do with the math or whether or not the loan is 'affordable' (whatever the hell _that_ means because not only is that not clear cut, I'm pretty sure it's not well defined from a legal perspective either).

Also, IIRC, the more common practice (at least initially) was to simply foreclose on the house and sell it again ... and again ... and again.  Preying on the poor was big business and is extremely profitable!  [1]  It might be nice to think that slum landlords and slum landlord lending deals are/were/will_be illegal, but I really don't think that's the case.  There's no ROI for making that happen.


>>*one single example* where the CRA or any other law or government
>>agency caused in some way a lender to issue a mortgage for someone
>>without looking at their income or credit history or caused in some
>>way a predatory lender to dupe a home owner and bank.

Nope, can't prove 'government cause'.  But I guess I'm missing the point on why that's necessary here.  It's sounding like you've never had to 'talk a brother down', man ... they come back from the lenders all happy and giggly and sh*t because, despite their low income, their problem credit, their outstanding bills and pending legal collection actions, they get told that they would qualify for a $150,000 house loan with zero down.  [WTF?!?]  You bring out the paper and pencil and show them it ain't happening because with that size note they can't afford food, gasoline, or cigarettes and *you* end up being the bad guy!  You're stepping on the dream, dude!  Buzzkiller!  It's not pleasant.  Dreams sell.  Reality bites.


Buzzkiller RonL.

[1] Unbef-ingleavably profitable!!  However, I actually _did_ decline to participate anyway.  (This karma crap better be worth it!  That's all I gotta say!)