Check out this little bit of math ... from the NY Times story.

2nd Paragraph: "Like so many families, they stretched to buy their first home. In the red-hot housing market at the time, they put no money down and got a mortgage for its entire $180,000 price tag."

So, by my math, this family has a $180,000 mortgage.

But, they refinanced their credit card debt (thus, saving THOUSANDS of dollars in high credit card debt interest).

"But the monthly payments on the $230,000 mortgage were $1,800, 40 percent higher than the first mortgage, and headed even higher.

So, the mortgage is now $50,000 higher than when they started.

But, they have no credit card debt any more and thus, no monthly payments for that high-interest debt, so ... there should be no problem right?

"So they decided to let the house go," the Times informs us.

No ... what these scumbags did was to screw those who gave them credit on the promise they would pay it back.

They're just ordinary deadbeats. (Exceptional only in that they have a friend who works at The Times who is helping them pull off this scam.)