I’m in court this morning watching one of my friends try a case. While I’m waiting for his trial to begin I’m watching and listening as the judge goes through his morning calendar, a series of quick procedural meetings with attorneys and their clients, related to several of the cases that the judge is currently presiding over. During one of these cases, a divorce proceeding, there was something said, in passing almost, that really twisted my head around.
The husband and wife were in court to talk about splitting up the marital assets and to some degree to talk about visitation rights for the couple’s two children. It became clear during the proceeding that their former residence, which had two mortgages, was in default. The first mortgage hadn’t been paid in over 4 months and the second mortgage was, as of about a month ago, no longer being paid as well.
You’d presume, based upon this information, that this was a couple who had a sub-prime mortgage and that they had gotten into the position they were in due to predatory lending practices. You’d presume this until you heard the woman’s attorney state that his client had, “$75,000 in credit card debt.”
$75,000 in credit card debt?
Holy cow! No wonder they couldn’t pay their mortgages.
Maybe not all of those houses in foreclosure are due to bad initial loans. Maybe it just has to do with people who haven’t a clue how to manage their personal finances.
So, should this be a mortgage that we bail out?
I think not.
And why on earth do credit card companies allow people to accumulate this much debt?
The credit card guys, to me, are the real predators. Loan sharks almost.
Who’s gonna reign them in?