Housing Mess Started With Bill Clinton In 1999

[FRPLG]

I think we can confidently blame the whole mess on just about anyone.

[SmootSmack]

Originally Posted by FRPLG

I think we can confidently blame the whole mess on just about anyone.

You can say that about so many things in our political world since the days of our founding fathers. But everyone needs someone to blame.

[MTK]

I'm just kidding by the way. But in all seriousness, whoever the next President is will be inheriting quite the mess.

[12thMan]

Dude, I feel sorry for whomever inherits this. Obama will be greatly constrained to implement his healthcare policy because of this bailout.

[djnemo65]

Anyway First, as someone who worked in the mortgage industry I can tell you that the claims made in that article are idiotic and borderline racist. As tech stocks cooled and September 11th threatened to puncture what had been a roaring American economy, the FED reduced interest rates to encourage investment in real estate, which was already a hot market. Programs like ARMS which had existed for a while exploded in popularity as housing prices began to appreciate at 20 percent or more per year. With equity piling up in homes people began to borrow against the value of their properties, assuming the free ride would go on forever. While they were of course wrong, the reversal of the housing market would have been a contained crisis if it wasn't for the reckless investment of Wall Street firms in collaterilzed debt packages: fantastically profitable, Wall St. kept watching the money come in, assuming the housing market would not regress, as there was no historical precedence for this in America. They were wrong, and what should have been a limited crisis in the US housing market punctured the entire global economy.

This is a complicated thing. It is not any one person's fault. You could of course blame Bush's "Ownership Society" which created tax incentives for buying over renting, further accelerating investment in the over-heated housing market. You could certainly blame the commitment to deregulation which reduced oversights that might have prevented so much Wall St. capital getting tangled up in murky debt packages. But to say that the increased minority homeownership which occurred under Clinton, which removed the racist barriers that had prevented minorities from owning homes at a rate equal to whites for like hundreds of years, was anything other than a good thing, is complete fucking bullshit. Seriously, bullshit. Racist fucking bullshit. I am furious right now that you would post this crap and I want to hear you defend the claims made by your author - with evidence, not partisan sloganeering.

[EternalEnigma21]

Originally Posted by djnemo65

Anyway First, as someone who worked in the mortgage industry I can tell you that the claims made in that article are idiotic and borderline racist. As tech stocks cooled and September 11th threatened to puncture what had been a roaring American economy, the FED reduced interest rates to encourage investment in real estate, which was already a hot market. Programs like ARMS which had existed for a while exploded in popularity as housing prices began to appreciate at 20 percent or more per year. With equity piling up in homes people began to borrow against the value of their properties, assuming the free ride would go on forever. While they were of course wrong, the reversal of the housing market would have been a contained crisis if it wasn't for the reckless investment of Wall Street firms in collaterilzed debt packages: fantastically profitable, Wall St. kept watching the money come in, assuming the housing market would not regress, as there was no historical precedence for this in America. They were wrong, and what should have been a limited crisis in the US housing market punctured the entire global economy.

This is a complicated thing. It is not any one person's fault. You could of course blame Bush's "Ownership Society" which created tax incentives for buying over renting, further accelerating investment in the over-heated housing market. You could certainly blame the commitment to deregulation which reduced oversights that might have prevented so much Wall St. capital getting tangled up in murky debt packages. But to say that the increased minority homeownership which occurred under Clinton, which removed the racist barriers that had prevented minorities from owning homes at a rate equal to whites for like hundreds of years, was anything other than a good thing, is complete fucking bullshit. Seriously, bullshit. Racist fucking bullshit. I am furious right now that you would post this crap and I want to hear you defend the claims made by your author - with evidence, not partisan sloganeering.

perfect. I was going to say the exact same things... except include the bush administration cutting the capital gains tax combined with the practice of like-kind trading allowing the tax to be skirted by savvy investors accross the country.

[That Guy]

congress is mainly to blame, and freddie/fannie for paying off so many of the people that were supposed to be watching it (just like the oil lobbies). the introduction of mortgage liquidity (selling bad debt tracts) also turned it into a total monster.

clinton and mccain both tried to get more control over them i believe, but too many people were looking the other way.

there's plenty of blame to go around.

[saden1]

Blaming minorities for the housing crises is akin to blaming the Jews for the Holocaust. And that's all I have to say about that.

[firstdown]

Originally Posted by saden1

Blaming minorities for the housing crises is akin to blaming the Jews for the Holocaust. And that's all I have to say about that.

No one was blaming them it seems that you take the easy reponse when you do not have a come back to answer a question. If I went back to allot of our threads a bunch of them end with your non response.

[jsarno]

This is a very good thread, however, was it really needed? No one will admit when Clinton did anything wrong, he's like a cult hero or something.
Let's be clear, while the lending institutions did give out money a little too willingly, there really is no one to blame other than the people themselves. We all like to point blame to others, and make excuses, but the general public asked for money and AGREED IN WRITING to pay it back, they are the ones that should be blamed. Hell, I want a Corvette, BADLY! But you don't see me with one do you???? Of course not, cause I can't afford it. I have excellent credit, I can have it right now if I want it, but I know that will kill me financially. Blame the institutions all you want, but there was a time when a man's word meant something, now it means shit.

[saden1]

Banks said no...lol. I must say FRPLG, this is by far the poorest post by you I have ever seen. If you're going to make grandiose claims please cite your references. Specific bills and laws, any article on lobby effort against "affordable housing" by banks from reputable sources (sorry, blogs don't count) will do. Happy hunting!

[FRPLG]

Originally Posted by saden1

Banks said no...lol. I must say FRPLG, this is by far the poorest post by you I have ever seen. If you're going to make grandiose claims please cite your references. Specific bills and laws, any article on lobby effort against "affordable housing" by banks from reputable sources (sorry, blogs don't count) will do. Happy hunting!

Baaaaaa!

[saden1]

Originally Posted by FRPLG

Baaaaaa!

That's what I thought.

-saden1 a.k.a. Rain Man II