Letters to the Editor
jebldmm
Published Letters: 933 Editor's Choice: 164
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Ignorance is not bliss
[Read the article: This is your subprime brain on drugs]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]When my husband and I decided to move to a different area, we approached a lender with a simple request: fixed rate, no prepayment penalty. With our credit and down payment, this should have been simple, but it wasn't. The first lender tried to talk us into a creative adjustable loan that would have cost us far more than the fixed rate loan. We said no, but I wonder how many people he convinced to switch? People tend to trust authority. They go to a lender and ask "how much house can I afford?", and believe what they are told. They don't understand amortization, much less negative amortization. When we talked to realtors, they tried to convince us to buy a more expensive house than we felt we could afford. We could have qualified for a more expensive house, but we didn't want to risk getting in over our heads. But the temptation was there, and we ended up buying a house that cost a bit more than we wanted to spend. Not more than we could afford (we set a strict upper limit), but definitely more than we planned. I wonder how many people were pushed by lenders and realtors into homes they couldn't afford? I wonder how many people really didn't understand what they were signing when the half inch thick pile of papers was placed under their noses at signing?
We need to change the process. The lenders have credit checks and notaries and (if they're smart) tax returns and pay stubs to verify that the borrower is credit-worthy. But buyers have ntohing. Realtors represent the seller, and buyer's agents are hard to find. We need to change the system so that each buyer works with an advocate for them instead of an agent who benefits from them spending more. We need somebody to tell buyers how much they are going to be spending on the loan, not depend on a lender who gets a commission for pushing creative loans. Somebody to explain to them that a negative termite inspection is not a warranty against problems, and help them find a good inspector, not depend on the seller to disclose all of the negatives. I know... "Buyer Beware". But buyer's don't know what they need to know to safely buy a house, and it seems that nobody is really interested in helping them.
Of course, this isn't going to happen, because too many people are getting rich off of the ignorance of the buyer. Realtors and lenders don't want an advocate steering the buyer through the mess -they want to be able to fleece the buyer. And if we end up with a few broken dreams, well that's just a valuable life lesson for the buyer, right?
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Baldness is not "Imperfection"
[Read the article: How can I comfort my boyfriend about losing his hair?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I have to disagree strongly with the basic premise of the letter. Going bald is not a tragedy. I'm married to a very sexy, bald man, and I wouldn't want him any other way. It sounds as if going bald will probably be a good thing for this man and the writer, because it will help both of them come to terms with their perceptions of imperfection, and hopefully expand their views about physical attractiveness.
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Countrywide deserves what they get
[Read the article: Is Countrywide running scared?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I just threw away a generous offer from Countrywide to refinance our home loan. In prominent letters they mention the 1.75% fixed rate for 5 years. Then I noticed that it was a 1.75% fixed rate "payment", and the APR (mentioned less prominently) is about two points over our current loan rate. Nowhere do they use the term "negative amortization" or explain that the difference between the payment interest and the actual interest will be added to the amount of the loan. They would probably say that they're helping struggling homeowners with this kind of loan, but we're not struggling and all this would mean for us would be lower payments now and a much higher payment after 5 years - and I'll bet any amount that they aren't making this offer to people who are upside down in their home loans or in serious financial straits. And the worst part is that the envelope said on the outside that there was important information about our loan, so I had to open it and look at this crap. I expect to be treated better by our lender.
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Were there any other issues brought up?
[Read the article: The Democrats' "gay debate" dance]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Given the tone of this article and another on this site, I would think that this should have been called "The Gay Marriage Debate". Were there any other questions? How did the candidates handle them? Do gay people care about anything other than marriage? Salon readers want to know. Well, at least this one does.
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@JenTStays
[Read the article: The Democrats' "gay debate" dance]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I think you meant "propagandize" our children in schools, not "propagate", although your version is funnier. That said, I live in California and read the papers, and I must have missed the hue and cry about parent's having to stop schools from teaching their children about, er, unusual sexual practices. Gay activists have kids, too, and they most assuredly don't want their children to be taught in schools about what are generally considered to be deviant sexual practices. They can learn about the nastier aspects of sex the way the rest of us do - from the internet. Finally, introducing the concept of "fisting" in a conversation about homosexuality is misleading. This is not a practice that is exclusive to, nor typical of, homosexuals. Most homosexual people are pretty much like you and me. They don't go in for sexual practices that involve pain or humliation. Actually, come to think of it, I should say they are pretty much like me. I don't know what turns you on.