The Foreclosure of America
By Adam Michaelson
It’s a scary title, and it’s not for the faint of heart. Its subtitle, however, is The Inside Story of the Rise and Fall of Countrywide Home Loans, the Mortgage Crisis, and the Default of the American Dream.
By Adam Michaelson
It’s a scary title, and it’s not for the faint of heart. Its subtitle, however, is The Inside Story of the Rise and Fall of Countrywide Home Loans, the Mortgage Crisis, and the Default of the American Dream.
Written by the former senior vice president of marketing for Countrywide Financial, the author chronicles his role in generating more and more mortgages for the firm and its eventual demise. He also includes his opinions and suggestions for the causes of foreclosures and possible solutions to avoid another economic housing tsunami.
There is no elaboration about the bundled collateralized mortgage obligations that contributed to banking and financial toxic assets and other complicated issues. He, rather, explains how people were lured into McMansions, Adjustable Rate Mortgages (ARMs,) and other exotic financial obligations. He also analyzes Americans’ materialism and the analogous corporate need for profits for companies and their shareholders.
The author portrays some lending activities as “small financial nuclear weapons, …with detonators set on varying times, which would eventually cause a cascading implosion of the worldwide economy.” Indeed, he says “fasten your seatbelts” for 2009, 2010, and 2011 when hundreds of billions of adjustable rate mortgages (ARMs) come due for resetting monthly mortgage payments."
There is also a fascinating courtroom scenario to establish “blame,” with a prosecuting attorney and a defense attorney arguing their respective positions, and the reader as the final judge.
Finally, the author includes 10 “What We Should Do Now” suggestions, the last one comprising a “Financial Responsibility” curriculum in schools. Perhaps, that should be Number 1 for all Americans.
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