Foreclosures Have Skyrocketed Over 70 Percent Since Last Year; Pose Grave Risks to Housing Values and Economy
WASHINGTON, DC – October 25, 2008 – (RealEstateRama) — Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton issued the following statement on a report released today on the housing market.
“Today’s most recent housing industry report shows a 71 percent increase in foreclosures since last year. This is just the latest piece of deeply alarming evidence that action is needed now to stem the rising tide of mortgage defaults and foreclosures. More than $1 trillion in mortgages will reset in the next year, increasing monthly payments for millions of homeowners. Mortgage payments may double or even triple for many homeowners, a formula for another wave of mortgage defaults and foreclosures in an already weakened housing market. At the same time, New Yorkers and Americans confront a home mortgage crisis in an economy that has shed jobs for nine straight months, while wages have remained flat and costs have soared. We must act to prevent a looming economic crisis in the near and long term.
For more than two years, the Bush Administration and its allies in Congress ignored the warning signs of a weakening housing market and mounting foreclosure crisis. And so a mortgage crisis grew into a financial crisis, and this financial crisis threatens a wider economic crisis. We cannot ignore the warning signs again. I have been calling for comprehensive steps to address this crisis for nearly two years, and have recently outlined a new initiative, the Home Owners Mortgage Enterprise (HOME), that would help rewrite unworkable mortgages that will otherwise force millions of homeowners into foreclosure. We can keep families in their homes while stabilizing the housing market and allowing the economy to recover. This initiative is based on an agency created by President Roosevelt during the Great Depression that saved more than one million homes while actually turning a profit for the Treasury. We have an opportunity to prevent this crisis from spreading further and I call on the Bush Administration and Congress to take immediate steps to put a coordinated and effective initiative like HOME in place.”
