“WASHINGTON — President Bush’s plan to slow the mortgage meltdown could help prevent hundreds of thousands of people from losing their homes, but many others would get no relief — and the plan’s effect on the broader economy remained a topic of sharp debate.” — Los Angeles Times
More reading on the topic, if you’re interested.
Bush mortgage plan would freeze rates – Los Angeles Times: “Bush administration will release a plan today that is expected to block many mortgages from adjusting to higher rates for as long as five years.”
It’s a pig in a poke. Even if it staved off recession, which it won’t because not enough mortgages would be able to qualify, it’s doesn’t help people. It just helps money. Perhaps the most silly part of the plan is the requirement that equity has been gained.
The five-year freeze will be offered to borrowers who live in their homes, are current on their mortgage payments, have accrued at least some equity in their homes and whose income indicates they cannot afford higher payments.
That means the value of the home has to have increased since the owner purchased it. A few years ago, I would have said Cool, they should’ve gotten some equity in about an hour and a half. Not anymore.
Millions of people bought at the height of the housing bubble, borrowed 100% on an overpriced home, and instantly were in upside down. Houses that sold around here for a million are worth $750K now. Where’s the equity in that?
The lending industry got people into this mess, and the lending industry needs to shoulder the burden of getting them out. It’s nothing but abject studpidity to loan hundreds of thousands, or even a million bucks, with no money down, secured by nothing but a single family home.
The solution is simple: restructure the loan to a fixed APR, and spread it out over 30-50 years, so the borrower can make the payments. It’s a win for everybody, because no one has to lose his home, the bank isn’t stuck with a house in a falling market, and the investors behind the bank don’t take it … badly.
I’m interested in the small details of everyday life, the little intangible, tragic, joyous, sanctified or profane habits that make us who were are. In fact, such are the fine focus of poetry and good writing; the intangible motes that make the shaft of light we writers throw on an otherwise mundane universe.
I almost always put my left sock on first, sitting on the edge of the bed, and then the right. The shoes later, on the way out. I keep them by the front door, kick them off when I come in.
In my story Winter Angel, it was very important to me that the man, when asking his wife to bring him more tea, does not pick up his cup from the table. It leaves it resting, and tilts it toward him, looking in. It was essential, somehow, to his reality, so it’s vital to mine.
Now I am drinking tea; Constant Comment, as they were out of my favorite Decaf Vanilla Chai at the store. This time of year, I like a spicy tea at night. Something to put me in mind of mulled wine. With my vitals well warmed, I can tell you, because it matters, that my old canine friend Tasha would come from any distance at the sound of a kiss, as well as a whistle.
The little things matter, because they are what we remember, and we are made of memory.
But I digress. I started off on this post because I wondered this thing, apropos of the socks and such:
Let’s say you’re working in your study, late of an evening as am I, and you decide to make a cup of tea. It doesn’t have to be this effeminate stuff I’m slurping; imagine anything you like. Do you boil the water, return to your desk, go back and pour the tea, and then let it steep beside you as you work? Or do you leave it to steep in the kitchen, and make another trip to fetch it, maybe adding sugar or lemon, when it’s ready?
Me, I do the latter, about 80% of the time. I don’t like to put the sweetener in with the tea bag, and I like to let it steep with a saucer over the cup. I imagine, despite the lack of evidence, it gets stronger that way. So it’s easier just to leave it, and set the timer on the microwave for 5 minutes or 10, and go back. Otherwise, I forget it, and it’s sitting there cold in the morning. A sad thing to wake up to.
Don’t tell me it just doesn’t matter, because, as we’ve seen, the dog is in the details.
A little something for my cat loving friends.
Courtesy of Aunt Julie.
“Southern California got a break from its dry streak Friday with an unexpectedly powerful rainstorm that clogged the freeway commute, unleashed some small mudslides and forced officials in Orange County to evacuate canyon communities hit by October’s brush fires.” | Los Angeles Times
Hey we need some rain in SB too, dudes! Quit bogartin‘ all the disasters. Dang.
Kidding.
But we do need rain.
Metaphor 