Some of those homes end up as rentals. The long-term social effects of foreclosures in the numbers we have seen will be tragic.

Part of a retirement plan is paying off your mortgage if you are fortunate enough to be able to get one and buy a house.

The wealth and income disparity in our country is not just a mathematical fact. It has a human side that will have to be reckoned with sooner or later. And I am supporting Bernie in great part because I want to see a peaceful reckoning.

I have friends who went literally from riches to rags due to miscalculations about mortgages, housing evaluations and what they could really afford in an economy that might turn down.

I had a job in which I saw a lot of personal financial statements. It really woke me up to the serious economic problems of a lot of working people.

This is a very important story. Thanks again.

A good, healthy economy has a certain balance. In my opinion (and I am not a trained economist) there is a lot of flexibility, but there has to be a balance so that money flows and is used well for the society as a whole.

I don't think our economy is at all healthy now, not by the measure I just set.

No, our economy is not healthy for anyone not in the top 1 or .1% It works best for everyone if $ circulate among all levels.

My wife's best friend lost her home to Mortgage Fraud. Her lawyer told her that she could sue and probably win, but that the bank would drag it out indefinitely and that it would cost more than they had in cash to fight. Best to walk away.

And heavens help my wife and I should we miss a mortgage payment at this point. With the equity we have Chase (not the originator of the mortgage of course) would foreclose in heartbeat, add fees, penalties and anything else they could and make a fat profit on us.

Fortunately we resisted the urge back in the mid '00s to buy the biggest place we could afford. Then came the Bush recession and my wife's job was shipped to China and we lost over half our income (most of which is gone forever and not coming back at this point). We would have been destroyed financially due that "miscalculation".

With the equity we have Chase (not the originator of the mortgage of course) would foreclose in heartbeat, add fees, penalties and anything else they could and make a fat profit on us.

Fortunately we resisted the urge back in the mid '00s to buy the biggest place we could afford. Then came the Bush recession and my wife's job was shipped to China and we lost over half our income (most of which is gone forever and not coming back at this point). We would have been destroyed financially due that "miscalculation".

It really looks to me like the crisis was in a sense set up. I don't know whether it was consciously set up, but it was a perfect set-up.

In California we have Depression Laws that protect people from having to pay off the rest of the mortgage if their house is foreclosed. Depends on the circumstances -- less than 4 units, one mortgage, etc. You lose your house, but at least you may be spared the bankruptcy court because the holder of your first mortgage or trust deed can only go after your house and cannot expect you to repay the full amount of the loan you borrowed. That is apparently not true everywhere.

Having only the first mortgage and no second aspect is important. Prior to 2008, we received offer after offer, many per week even per day at times, of second mortgages.

Of course, I knew the rule, so we were not tempted to take on a second mortgage and repair our old house. But many of our neighbors fell for it.

If we had not had the foreclosure crisis and that sucking sound thanks to the trade agreements, many Americans would have paid off their mortgages and at least have that wealth. As it is, the money people put into paying off mortgages and building wealth equity in their homes now belongs to the banks.

The aftermath of the bank/foreclosure crisis has been to make the wealthy wealthier and the poor and middle classes poorer. Was it a plan? Hard to prove, but follow the money. The big banks and hedge fund managers are smart. But it is still hard to prove. From this vantage point looks like it was a scam or at least that it could have been easily prevented or dealt with more fairly. I fault Congress, Obama and Bush for bailing out the banks and mortgage companies without really protecting homeowners' equity.

Feel the Bern! Bernie understands the perfidy of the people who are overly greedy for money, the hedge fund managers and bankers. They have utterly no morality in my view.

I have a hard time explaining what I saw to my friends and family. They do not want to see it for what I can see it. That is because they do not understand the laws that were in place, the Depression laws and how they worked and how they were exploited in California.

Before we had caller ID, I remember receiving those phone calls for second TD’s. I would quote an interest rate that I would need to do anything that was below what money markets were paying at the time that would be met with “We can’t do that!” and “Don’t you need the money?” for which I would reply, “Sure!, feel free to leave a bag of cash on the porch if you would like, just don’t expect anything in return from us” which was always met with silence which ended the call.

In all seriousness though, my wife’s friend and her husband I described before did nothing wrong, didn’t buy above what they could afford, a modest house in a modest neighborhood, just were not financially savvy and were taken advantage of when she lost her job temporarily. They now rent a house that is almost the same a half mile from the home they owned. There will be no equity to live off in their future or pass to their daughter. Let the rethugs have their way and there will be no Social Security or Medicare either.

And that is what the economy is about now, EXTRACTION. Shift wealth upward. And even if you get that, it’s hard to avoid. I agree Bernie gets it, and even more importantly fights it! That’s why he has my respect and support. Third Wayers and the DLC' "Not so Much".

There have been good posts here on DU about the deals that were made and how promises reneged on with regards to the Bank bailout and how almost zero $ got to actual mortgage holders. I will say this; when you have people around you like Geithner and Summers, “What the hell do you expect!?”

The Hillary supporters don't understand what happened to this country. Because Bill Clinton set the stage. He may not have realized he was doing it, but he was not astute enough to ask the right questions about what the ultimate repercussions would be for signing the repeal of Glass-Steagall, the revision of the welfare system and so many other bills he signed. The Telecommunications Act which has permitted near monopolization of the airwaves by the right wing.

The Clintons just don't ask the right questions. That's why I cannot vote for Hillary.

Feel the Bern!