This is the second installment of a five-part series titled Too Little to Save, in which the National Council of La Raza (NCLR) highlights a family and describes their struggles with foreclosure.
A husband, a pregnant wife, and a five-year-old son: This is the Nunez family of northwestern Georgia. The parents watched their employment hours dwindle, and after losing their main source of income, they ultimately confronted the prospect of losing their home. While searching for jobs, Mr. and Mrs. Nunez petitioned their bank to help them until they found employment. Mr. Nunez said the bank was not helpful:
I sent a letter to the bank explaining my case... They told me that they couldn't help me and that I had to pay about $12,000. I wasn't able to get any help from them. There was no program back then that could help people who were in my same situation. So I had to go into foreclosure.
Mounting frustration weighed on the Nunez household. They lost their home and moved from place to place, sparking contention between the parents.
I think that what has been affected the most is the relationship between me and my wife. We almost got divorced. We keep thinking about the instability for our son, and it has been very difficult for us.
Unemployment, foreclosure, and a sense of hopelessness entirely derailed the Nunez family from a prosperous path and provoked the unraveling of their family bonds.
We could see that all of our efforts [with the bank] were useless. There was a lot of tension... Today my son asked me again, "Why are you undoing my bed? Are we going to another house?" I mean, it's difficult as a parent [to go] from one place to another wanting to be stable.
Unemployment is now the leading cause of delinquency for families facing foreclosure. Foreclosure, however, does not have to be the inevitable consequence of losing a job. Nowadays, many families might experience an extended bout of unemployment lasting eight months or longer. Most of them are not aware that there may be options other than foreclosure during employment dry spells.
During the next few days, legislators will decide on a foreclosure prevention provision included in the banking reform bill. It could help many hundreds of thousands of homeowners prevent needless foreclosures due to temporary unemployment and fill a major gap in current foreclosure prevention efforts. NCLR strongly encourages the Conference Committee to support this provision and create a loan program for jobless homeowners.
The ten hardest-hit states have already received funds to develop their own programs to help unemployed homeowners with underwater loans. These programs need to be extended on a national level. Such unemployment services could represent the reprieve families need during these tumultuous times. We know well that a series of foreclosures can be a neighborhood's demise. If the Nunez family had received extended benefits, they would have had more time to secure work, hold on to their home, and retain their wealth for future generations.
Has your life been affected by the risk of foreclosure? If so, please share your experience. Contributing to this project will help decision-makers to better understand the depth of this continued foreclosure crisis and take better steps to address it. Your personal story could impact their decisions.
Click here for the previous installment of Too Little to Save.
We all have unique stories and ALL feel abused and neglected by
both the banks and government that has failed on all levels to
protect it's citizens basic needed for housing.
The things that bother me most are that these(myself included) are
regular folks. Average, middle class, blue collar Americans who
have been pushed aside and forgotten.
Remember how good everyone felt 3 years ago because we knew someone
was going to get elected and help us build better lives and futures?
Naa...Me neither.
The president turned this mess over to Biden, IMHO a man who is nothing more
than a spoiled frat boy and haven't we had enough of that.
Biden, a man who as senator from a state with few if any usury laws and while his
son made millions as a lobbyist for the banking cabal, wrote these laws that we're
all suffering under. I expect NOTHING to be done. I now truly believe the
government doesn't care.
They can promise to give BILLIONS to help the Euro.
Give 50 BILLION to 'promote' broadband expansion.
And even promise those in the gulf that their mortgages will be paid for.
Yet the rest of the country....FU
http://www.homemortgageinformation.org/
There have been way too many families destroyed by this economic meltdown.
Much of this IS the fault of congress...they are no longer elected to work for our best interests...their only concern is their next reelection and just how much they add to their own personal wealth. Greed, corruption and lack of compassion for those in distress will destroy our country long before any terrorist will.
We must all try to remain strong even more so in times of despair. Cling to each other, and dont let the dark forces rip you apart, brothers and sisters. Be happy for the little things, and use the power of prayer. I hope that some of the damages can be repaired, we all need to be tolerant and forgiving, for we all go a little bit nuts when we get knocked down into the dirt by an unjust economy.
Until you have walked in the shoes of the unemployed you can't possibly understand the nightmare many are living. You seem to imply the high rate of unemployment is the fault of those previously working poor with the least advantages, as if they don't WANT a job. I'm sure there are people abusing the system, but you seem to be unaware unemployment doesn't pay as much as a paycheck. It's not easy to collect unemployment IF you QUIT a job, I know it's possible but not standard. Do you have any idea how difficult it is find a job of any kind these days? Do you have any idea how businesses are taking advantage of that, paying less for working harder and longer with no benefits? If you're over 50, forget it....your chances of finding a job are practically none.
Businesses still making a profit should count their blessings and try to do what they can to improve this disaster instead of the constant complaining about tax credits, uncertainly of reg reform and healthcare reform, etc.....
sorry for the length of this..continued
and if a small bank....the name of the parent bank...
its during times like this that it behooves all Americans to
know who was there when the times were bad
and who was not.....
in this case, without all the details i cannot judge...
but it seems to me the bank was in the prime position to
help these folks....
and they were NOT there for them...
which bank was it???
A Black guy with an auto-body shop, and a white guy with rental businesses, trucks, mini-warehouses and offices, told me about unemployment: Congress's policies are sustaining it.
The white guy has the area's last family-owned storage facility. Since 2008, the seven other family-owned warehouses went out of business and were taken over by out-of-state corporations that auctioned nonpaying tenant’s possessions without warning. Local owners can care: he loans tenants a truck if they need to leave.
How is Congress causing employment?
First, O’Bama repealed the Section 179 investment-expense deduction. This credit helped small-business owners expense the first $250,000 in the same tax year, instead of waiting 3 to 5 years to deduct equipment and 20 to 30 years to deduct real-estate. The multi-business guy would hire people if he could replace worn-out equipment and expense it.
Second, increasing unemployment benefits from two months to two years forced many states to triple unemployment-insurance rates, which decreased hiring.
Third, people quit their jobs because there’s no incentive to work: unemployment benefits pays as much as a job and might include health-insurance. The white employer said that a private placement agency’s owner had been embarrassed when new hires left after realizing that unemployment paid as much as their job. The auto-body owner's best employees also left because they made the same money on unemployment and prohibitive unemployment assessments prevent his training new workers.
When I asked why his shop was empty when he had so many cars waiting to be repaired, the body-shop owner told me yesterday at 6:00 PM, "my best guys won't come back because they make as much on unemployment."
Draw your own conclusions.
But first, we need to stop all foreclosures now. Put a freeze on all foreclosures immediately.
That needs to be our first step in helping homeowners.