The Mortgage Crisis: A Catalyst of Hope

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Daphne was a little over one year old, Jack was a brand new baby, and business was going well at the cabinet shop for Claud. I graduated from law school and decided to be a stay at home mom. We were like Rickie and Lucy, only Claud worked days…and wasn’t Cuban. We just bought our first house together. I was so excited. We were about to buy the house we were renting when we noticed a new development going in down the street. These houses were bigger and brand new. That’s better, right? So, we pulled in and had ourselves a look at the models. It was like a whirlwind because before we knew it, we moved in. I remember sitting in the living room on the first night asking Claud, “how did we do this?” A few days earlier we saw the “Sold” sign on the house we were interested in. We giggled and I said, “they think we are really buying it.” But then, we were signing the paperwork and guess what…they gave us a check at the closing for thousands of dollars.

We were living the American dream…in the suburbs. We used the check to buy new furniture for the house and to pay our first month’s mortgage. Then, we realized that we couldn’t afford to landscape it or put in window treatments. I don’t know what we were thinking. We were just so excited to live in a big beautiful new home. We also figured that if we qualified for the mortgage, we must earn enough. Really, we were pretty stupid not to figure it out on our own. We should have known.  

We were only in our house for two months when Claud came home from work and said, “I had a meeting with Sharon, our accountant, today. She lives in the most amazing town. She has several horses and five acres of land. Apparently, it’s a lot cheaper there too and it’s not that far away.” “Wow, really?” was all I said as I let these words process in my mind. I was still thrilled with the concept that we were able to buy this house. That in itself was a miracle. I didn’t worry too much because there was no way in a million years, we would qualify for another mortgage when we hadn’t paid the last two months of this one.  

You won’t believe it and I didn’t either. We qualified! We moved all of our belongings to the new new house. We were so excited and happy that the payment was less. Plus, we had much more land and lived in the country. We weren’t Ricky and Lucy anymore. Oh wait a minute, Ricky and Lucy moved out to the country too.

We weren’t in the new new house long before things began going downhill at the cabinet shop.  Again, we couldn’t make the mortgage payments. We loved this house. Our home was filled with love, friendship, and a lot of…stuff. Within the year that we lived in our rental house, then the new house, and now this one, you wouldn’t believe how much stuff we accumulated. We had horses, which came with reins, saddles, boots, and hats. We had a jet ski with vests, and a trailer. We had a four bedroom house fully furnished and a garage full of extra things. We had skis, and a huge fish tank, and more baby toys and clothes then we ever thought possible.

The cabinet shop was closing down and there was no way we could keep the house. Claud came home one night from work looking very distressed, “I don’t know what to suggest. We are going to lose this house.” I hated to see him so worried. He usually wasn’t a worrier. “I really don’t care, honey, we can live in a small apartment. I just want to be with you and the kids,” I reassured him, “we don’t need to own a home. None of this is so important. We can start again.”

“I think we should move back to England.” I gave him the same puzzled look I gave back when he wanted to leave the first new house. England? Does he remember why we left England? Then he said, “I think we should sell everything we own and buy tickets for all of us to move back. We can live on my family’s farm until we have enough money to move to France.” He had me. He knows me too well. I looked into those beautiful blue eyes and jumped in his lap to give a full body hug.

I absolutely love France. To live in France is my absolute dream. “You’ve got it! We could move to a little village. The kids would learn French and go to French school. Oh, how sweet they would sound speaking French! I would learn French. I’m in.” I stopped talking but my wandered on to how I would drink amazing wine and maybe work in a vineyard, or grow my own grapes, the cheeses I would eat, the olives I’d make from my own trees. We’d eat that delicious three bean soup at the little café in Paradou. We would grow our own vegetables. We could go to bull fights. We’d live off of the land. Yes, we could live off of the land! “Claud, lets get rid of all of this crap. Where do we start?” We spent the next few weeks at home in our robes cooking crouque mousier for breakfast and chocolate crepes for lunch and looking at French houses on the internet. I was in heaven.

The following weekend we posted signs for our garage sale. We wrote, “Everything in our house is for sale”. This drew the attention we desired. We could only take our suitcases and babies to England with us. Even though the sale was the following day, we couldn’t miss our last Friday night karaoke at the 49er. We shut the place down and cried saying bye to everyone. For the last song of the night, Claud and I sang, “I’m leaving on a jet plane.”

At 6 a.m. there were people lined up at our gate, waiting for us to open up for business. We threw water on our faces, brushed our teeth, and opened the gates. We gave people the greatest deals. A lot of things were free. I watched an old woman steal our iron. I would have given it to her. It was cathartic seeing everything go out the door: a toaster, kitchen table, book shelves and a table we grew in our garden, silverware, linens, and on and on. By the end, we had a stack of cash in our pockets (enough for the flights out of the country), an empty house, two happy babies and huge smiles on our faces. We had nothing left, except for our suitcases filled with clothes and our babies. We stripped down to nothing but felt like we had more then we ever had before…hope. Three days later, we were sitting in a jet, flying to a new home and a new adventure.

It’s a really long story but we are back in the states now. Who knows where we would be today if all of this didn’t happen. If not for the crazy mortgages banks were giving out back then, we never would have been able to buy the first house or the second. Now, I know that if I believe I can’t afford something, I won’t do it even if someone is willing to give me the money for it. The lessons learned and deciding to give every material possession up and begin again was the greatest thing we ever did. So, for the blessings that come out of every hardship, I am not regretful for any of it. Instead, I am greatful for all of it.