WASHINGTON — Nearly one in every four homeowners across the country owe more on their home than it’s worth. Once a month, those 10.8 million are faced with a question that cuts to the core of the American Dream and offers a confusing collision between a deep-seated sense of personal obligation and a cold, simple business calculation: Should I pay my mortgage?
For decades, there was only one answer for most people: Of course I should keep paying, it’s the right thing to do. Besides, the argument went, a home is a great investment. Today, in the wake of the most seismic housing collapse in the nation’s history, that logic has increasingly been challenged by homeowners despondent about their lack of options.
Although researchers find that some underwater borrowers who could continue paying their mortgages strategically default anyway, the vast majority continue to pay. Many homeowners, out of a combined sense of fear, shame, courage and morality, resist making what is otherwise a logical financial decision.
Walking away from a home, however, is more than the sum of a few business decisions. For many homeowners, it’s either an act of civic defiance against a system they no longer buy into or the end result of being shuffled around by institutions that don’t help them solve their financial problems.
While walking away is a frightening and dangerous step into the unknown, millions have beaten the path in the past few years. To find out what it’s like to walk away, The Huffington Post asked readers who were considering making the move, or who had already done so, to write in and share their stories. That was in January 2010. A year later, we followed up with them to see how they reflected on the experience.
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