You Will Be Serfs! UPDATED!

This was written right before we walked away from Maplehurst and got this beautiful house in Tucker in June 2014. We are happy as clams and have not one single regret about deciding to rent. And we will NEVER buy again. FUCK THAT. Thanks to not buying, we now have investments, a fat savings account and NO DEBT. Buying a house will make you house poor. It’s totally not worth it to me. I’m always amazed when I STILL hear that old saw “renting is throwing away your money.” Really? Well, since we bailed on a $75k underwater house that would NEVER be worth what we paid, we are in the best financial shape of our lives! Seems to me that renting has SAVED us money, not “thrown it away.” But whatever, you suckers want to be indentured to the banks, y’all go right ahead and buy. Ain’t my circus.  – Angela April 2 2016. 

Yesterday we watched some financial revenge porn in the form of the movie Assault on Wall Street. It was FABULOUS. All the asshole brokers got what they deserved – and I don’t mean more money. Then we watched Office Space to round out our day of Fuck This Shit.

We did not get the house we coveted (THANK THE GODS!!) due to various mortgage lender jackassery.

On top of that aggravation, the mortgage guy, Murray, is all about reminding us about how hard it is out there for a pimp of the mortgage industry and how the investors suffered. I held my tongue, but I’m telling you, it was hard not to tell him to fuck right on off. WHY anyone would feel the least bit bad about an industry that broke the United States’ economy, then took trillions MORE of our money and never lost a penny is beyond me. Actually, the banks and mortgage industries are just fine and dandy, thanks for asking. They have shown record profits since the bailouts (read: extortion money).

Speaking of the bailouts and what’s happened since, here’s some reading for you:
We’re almost break even on the bailout. Sept 2013
Why Fannie and Freddie remain a big threat. Aug 2013
Wall Street bonuses to top 2009. Aug 2013

I love how most people in the mortgage industry own at least one rental property. That goes for Realtors®, too. I also love how they can look you in the eye and with a straight face, tell you how hard it’s been for them. RIGHT.

Really, motherfuckers? I fail to see how buying up property for pennies on the dollar to rent back to the people who were fucked in the ass and tossed out on the street by bad and/or underwater loans is “hard”. ??

It is my assertion that the main goal of the mortgage industry is to reduce Americans to being serfs. It is practically impossible to get a loan now (despite all the Obama bullshit about “Making Homes Affordable” with HARP*) and if you manage it, you’ll be saddled with a $200/mo fee (called “insurance” by FHA) for the life of the 30 year loan. That comes to $72,000 of additional fees that go straight to the FHA coffers. In the past, PMI (private mortgage insurance) was only until you gained some equity or refinanced – NO MORE. Now it’s forever on FHA loans. [*HARP is still going on. If you are stupid enough to TAKE an offer of extending your mortgage for another 10 years, you deserve what you get. That is TEN YEARS more interest and mortgage insurance that goes DIRECTLY to the banks and insurance companies. Anyone who takes a HARP refinance on an underwater home is a fucking moron. -A 2016]

And yes, you’ll have an FHA loan unless you have pristine credit and 20% to put down. And don’t think that your parents can help with that down payment. NOPE. You can’t use any gifts for down payments. If you do get a gift, then it must sit in the bank for six months and you have to get written proof of where that money came from. Cash is frowned upon in this brave new world. It is frightening the threats you’ll hear if you have cash. We know, we were threatened because we wanted to use our rainy day cash money for a down payment. You would’ve thought we asked if we could use dead babies.  INSANE.

When real estate crashed, the rich white people and corporations moved in to buy up every available foreclosure as “investment property”. What that means is that most of the good deals that might have been had by first time buyers were snapped up and turned into rental property. This reduced inventory of homes and made it harder to find a home for sale on the low end. It’s now mostly high end homes that a first time owner cannot afford. Now, add that to the near impossibility of getting a home loan in the first place and you are a society of serfs. People who own very little and pay rent to our rich overlords.

What the mortgage industry and its rich white owners aimed to do is push America back to the early 1900s, when the rich were rich and the rest of us were serfs who paid them rent. They were successful in that aim. Home ownership is at an all time low. The economy is stagnant and not looking very promising. There is little job creation.

Fortune: What happens if nothing changes at Fannie and Freddie?
“Without the discipline of a private market, we are in danger of creating another speculative housing bubble, which would again result in massive losses and economic hardship when it bursts.” – Hank Paulson, Fortune magazine, Aug 28, 2013. [linked above]

The 1% have won, my friends. Most Americans have been beaten back to early 20th century standards and no one is doing a thing about it. Rich white men and large corporations have seized the biggest indicator of individual wealth: real estate. Owning a home is the epitome of the American Dream. Thanks to these rich people, who continually get richer, the rest of us are little more than indentured servants. Serfs.

[Take a look at the building industry right now – especially here in Atlanta. All you see are apartments and McMansions being built. NOTHING in between. Moderate housing, like our neighborhood, is on the market for a couple of weeks and the seller gets what they ask. It is insane. There is little available for first time buyers. So people rent.  I don’t see why anyone would want to buy right now, the market for buying kinda sucks unless you have a fat down payment.  -A 2016]

It’s infuriating and demeaning to be reduced to a society with little personal wealth for 99% of its citizens. It’s sickening to see the 1% cheerfully declare the rest of us its serfs. It’s in the background of every pompous, rich landlord’s assurances that it’s OK to rent, listen for it: “You WILL BE Serfs! And you will like it!” “Oligobble our balls!” Which is also pertinent to the Comcast takeover of Time Warner this week. OLIGOBBLE. You’ll take what we give you.

We are bitter and resentful of the way we were treated by these rich fucks in the mortgage industry. We are sick to death of hearing how hard it is for the poor beleaguered banks, investors and corporations.

If you, too, need some revenge porn to lessen your bitterness and resentment, DO rent Assault on Wall Street. It is the story of desperation that SO MANY Americans deal with (it hits on healthcare, housing and investing), but the hero gets to give it back to the fuckers that so deeply deserve it. It won’t change anything, but it’ll damn sure make you feel a bit better.

Ok, back to your regularly scheduled serfdom.