Ditch your Mortgage? ? ?

reBlog from Administrator: Obama to US Banks: Expand Foreclosure Prevention!

I found this fascinating quote today:

Editor’s Note: The Obama Administration has moved to increase a qualifying hurdle for homeowners called Loan-to-Value (LTV) ratios from 105% to 125%.  That means, before this adjustment, if your house is currently worth $200,000 and you owe $250,000 on your mortgage, you now qualify for a loan modification with this increase in this ratio.  The challenge is that on the West Coast (California, Nevada, Arizona) and other states with higher median loan values during the housing bubble inflation period, 125% is still not high enough to provide relief through loan modification.  What about the families that have experienced dramatic value losses on their homes due to severe foreclosures in their neighborhoods and are now 150%-175% LTV?  The California Association of Realtors (CAR)  and other trade groups had been asking Congress and the last administration to consider a higher LTV for over a year.  I’m glad that it has now occurred but can the current administration be doing more?Administrator, Obama to US Banks: Expand Foreclosure Prevention!, Jul 2009

You should read the whole article.

Are there tent cities in your area?

Tent cities are popping up around the country and you have to ask one simple question...has it really come to this?



In a news conference on March 5, 2009, President Obama was asked this question regarding tent cities...



1 in 50 children are now homeless in America? Could this be possible? While statistics are always thrown around in the media, the fact that ONE child is homeless and living on the street is ONE too many.

The mission of our nonprofit has never rang so true: To empower American families facing economic crisis to forge a new future through cooperative partnerships. Our pilot program in San Diego is currently identifying working families with kids that are facing foreclosure in order to help them find a home in the next 6-12 months.

While this endeavor is a tall order in light of the sheer magnitude of the problem, we owe it to our most valuable resource, our kids, to change this reality and make a difference in our communities. If you are interested in finding out more or would like to help our cause by providing ideas, volunteering, or financial support, follow me on twitter and facebook. We are in the process of launching a national awareness campaign and we will be posting all the details in the next two weeks.

America needs a new spirit, a new type of pioneer. The pioneers that settled our country were independent people that were interdependent of each other for their communities to grow and prosper. In order for our communities to recover and grow, we must help those working families with kids that have been hit the hardest by these economic times to forge a new future. Because only United can We Prosper!

Kids and Foreclosure

Ever wonder what happens to the kids whose family loses their house to foreclosure? Owning a house is not just a place to call home and rest, it's also an address. With that address comes many benefits of which, public education is one of the biggest. In the state of California, if you lose your home, your children are automatically disenrolled from the district school that they attend. Why? Well, in some school districts there are waiting lists for kids to attend their neighborhood school due to overcrowding. So if you lose your primary residence, your kids no longer qualify to go to the local school. While they can be enrolled back into another school district, it does not negate the fact that the system as it currently stands in San Diego is designed to make room for kids at the expense of other kids. The system is flawed but I do not blame the teachers or administrators. They are doing an incredible job with the limited resources that they have and increasing requirements that are imposed on them by outside agencies. While there is room for improvement, my purpose here is to only highlight that a problem exists and solutions should be made available to families that now find themselves without a home.

The Journey Begins.....

"Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person. ~Mother Teresa"

Thus begins my quest to make a better place for my children to live in. If we haven't met yet, I'm just an ordinary guy who is living through, like you, some of the most turbulent economic times that this country has seen in the last 70 years. I have the same dreams, hopes, and aspirations for my family as the guy next door. But the question that I was groping with day after day was, am I leaving this world a better place for my children and their children?

Hello, my name is Egbert and it was suggested to me that I start documenting my journey to establish a national service organization called the New Pioneer Foundation. The idea of this project came from a decision that I made. What was the decision? That life had to get better. It did. And that's were the story begins of a journey that I am starting and would like to share with you.

This blog will be a running tally of events that have unfolded so far in my quest to establish, organize, fund, and grow the organization.

So, check in once in a while, and see where my journey takes us. If you are on twitter, facebook, or linkedin, I invite you to connect with me. My profile is egbertoostburg for all three and I will be tweeting my network when a new post is available. If you have any thoughts, ideas, comments or suggestions, I welcome the feedback as I never know where the next good idea will come from. Enough with the Preface, let the games begin!