Wow. It's like right out of the Great Depression. Beware the hobo uprising.

PULEEEZ! There is a tent city in the city of Ontario. Its pretty far from LA. Its not made of people who lost their homes but instead long time homeless from all over. The city of Ontario would like to limit it to people who actually are from Ontario but so far it has not worked. The Brits should stay home and do specials on British dental health.

@SoCalGNX: But this tent city IS made up of people who lost their homes in the sub-prime foreclosures. I don't see your point in talking about about Canada and then talking trash about the Brits.

@hi: I believe SoCalGNX is referring to Ontario, California, not Ontario, Canada.

SirWired

@hi: Ontario CA i would guess. But I agree. Point?

@hi: One thing the Brits have right is ignorance of geography: The CITY of Ontario is a city that's east of Los Angeles and has nothing at all to do with the Canadian province of the same name.

@hi: Ontario, California. Not Canada. Besides, Ontario is a Canadian province, not a city.

This is the kind of non-story the British media just loves. That tent city has been there forever. The fact that some of the homeless living there now are former sub-prime borrowers shouldn't be a surprise to anyone, but it's not as though we're reliving the Great Depression or anything with tent cities springing up all over the country. Give me a break. Maybe they should go back to covering what the royals had for breakfast.

I kind of wish I could feel bad for these people that fell for the loan traps and/or were too ignorant to read before they signed, but I just can't.

I mean, if you're living outside of your means, its time to cut back on those expenses, move back in with your parents, and file for bankruptcy. Too bad that it will hurt your credit, at least you won't be "homeless" which is what I consider someone taking "an extended camping trip."

If you read this article in todays LA Times it kind of dispels the notion that the majority of these people lost their homes due to foreclosures. The article focuses on the fact that city officials are trying to limit it to people who had permanent addresses in Ontario prior to becoming homeless.

Damn link won't work, cut and paste this into your browser:

"http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-tents18mar18,1,5139391.story?page=2"

It's definitely depressing, but having lived in a college town for a while, I've seen homeless folk gather together like this before.

hasnt this been in the news for a while, plus most of these people where homeless to begin with.

Awwww. Paying the price for irresponsible borrowing and spending? I feel for the kids, but the adults got themselves into the situation.

Most of those those people had homes with jobs and incomes prior to foreclosure, why didn't they just get apartments or other rentals? I understand some people may have lost their jobs as well.

I wonder how much verification was put into the idea that these people are in tents because they were foreclosed upon?

--
Kevin
[velcroman98.googlepages.com]

@Kevin Cotter:
Actually, the story talks about people who ended up losing a job or had an illness that caused them to sell their houses. That had little to do with subprime mortgages.

If the BBC (and not just the Consumerist) is putting this out as a subprime mortgage story, then they're doing some sloppy reporting.

@unklegwar:

sure, stupid overspending does happen.

but.... how about those who are subject to a bad economy???

buy a house within your means... then the economy tanks, you lose the great paying job from a layoff, the price of heating oil goes through the roof, taxes go up, everything else that you had within your budget 5-10 years ago now is impossible to pay for like it once was.

please don't write off every foreclosure as "greed".

I wonder if they bought more tent then they can afford

That guy who posted all over the web about "they will live in tent cities, and Hondas" was RIGHT! Holy shit!

@Bladefist:
EVIL!

But hilarious... :-D

why didn't they just get apartments or other rentals?

I'm taking a stab here but most corporate-managed apartments don't take kindly to bankruptcies or foreclosures. I would imagine that the rest of the rental market is saturated. Why they don't move out of SoCal, however, I don't understand and I can't really watch a video at work right now.

@hi: Excellent troll, hi. Good job.

@fuzzymuffins: I hear what you are saying but most of the defaults and foreclosures are a result of people taking on more then they can afford. Only a small percentage of foreclosures are due to hardships(as in losing ones job), illness or other things outside the control of the borrower.

@Gev: Oh come on. If you live half a world away, the minutiae of individual townships become insignificant. I could say "east London suburbs," or I could say "Barking, County Essex." one is easier to grasp if you don't live on the island. @timmus: A friend of mine works as a leasing agent in Dallas for several properties. For anybody with "negative credit reporting," they require 3-4 months up front + cosigner for a one-year lease. It's going to take some time, but I think all this corporate greed and nastiness will take care of itself before long. And the tent cities will get bigger.

In the First Great Depression the camps were called "Hoovervilles". I humbly suggest these be called "Green Zones".

@PirateSmurf: Read the book "The Two-Income Trap." The majority of BKs happen as a result of medical expenses and divorces. Everything costs more, so much more that two incomes aren't enough to pay for what one income could provide a generation ago. My daddy, working at a middle-class job in the 1960s-70s, could provide a home for 6 children and my mom, who stayed home. Unless daddy's a doctor or other top-wage professional, it's not happening now.

@timmus: You would guess correctly.

You can usually get copies of credit guidelines from leasing agents, if you ask nicely. Or you can go with a private owner who usually won't give a damn about credit.

Kind of sad that we're spending billions of dollars overseas but we're rotting from the inside out.

@timmus: Leaving SoCal might be a good idea in theory, but possibly more difficult in practice. If you don't have money to live indoors, renting a truck to haul away your remaining possessions is probably out of your reach as well. Ever tried renting a truck? If trucks are available, you normally wait a month or so and save as much as 50%. No one wants to wait while homeless, but the massive egress of people from California's collapsing real estate market make finding a truck even more difficult. The ensuing demand has caused many rental agencies to increase pricing accordingly.

No possessions to haul? That's good. Unfortunately gas is also nearing 4 dollars a gallon in most California towns. Just reaching the California border can be expensive, let alone points beyond.

I do feel bad for these folks. Many of them were lied to outright, as in, "Home values always go up. It's safe to borrow some more." Preying on peoples ignorance of the realities of the situation was morally corrupt at best, and knowingly defrauding people of their homes at worst. The unfortunate consequence of this is that many former home owners really were turned into tent city dwellers.

Unfortunately. I think this situation will get worse before it gets better.

I try to see the positive in most situations, and about the only positive thing I can say about this is, that some of these folks are now experiencing first hand what it's like to be a migratory worker in Southern California.

Ontario CALIFORNIA. The Brits are the ones who put this "report" together. There used to be something known as yellow journalism and the last few years has shown a return of it.
@hi:

OMG - This is just scary and unbelievable.

Ummm...Seems like they need to run "The Grapes Of Wrath" in reverse for these people.
It's not that the great majority of Americans don't have some sympathy for people such as this,but....But,they don't have to live in the priciest state in the country. They tell me that you can't get a decent house for less than 4-500,000 bucks in southern California. Okay, I'll admit that's a tough nut to crack for these homeless folks.But where I live in the south,houses are going begging for $175,000 with 2800 sq. ft,good schools and beautiful scenery.I would like to politely suggest that they move from the land that has made them paupers and come to where things are more down to earth. Be willing to go where you can afford to live,or quityerbitchin.
Before I get flamed about "you just don't understand" , uh, yes I do.I have done exactly what I am suggesting (many years ago)and have lived to tell the tale. They could damn sure do it if there was no fucking choice (just like the Joads in TGOW)...

I think by the end of the year, we'll be seeing a lot more of these homeless camps.

While I agree with you that brokers and originators spread the honey excessively about home prices rising.
You cannot excuse borrowers from blame, buying a home is a life changing experience but people that signed the loan docs didnt do the research and homework that they should have done. This includes reading the docs, understanding the loan. Balancing their budget, making sure that they could afford the max amt of interest, and or getting an attny to go over the loan docs so they can understand them.
There is a disclosure that clearly states what the interest is and what the max interest that can be charged.
The fact is most people signed with wide open eyes, they entered with denial or plain ignoring the obvious. They didn't want to hear, "I am sorry but you don't qualify for the loan" They wanted the home now and didnt care how as long as they got approved.
Are mortgage companies to blame, yes thru lax underwriting and not doing better background checks but the borrowers are just as guilty, and of course thru bad management and a dash of dishonesty in some instances.
I feel for these people but that fact is they dug their own holes.
When did it become the job of businesses and corporations to make sure the borrower is making the right financial decision?
Personal responsibility is the point here and people rushed into something without first doing what is needed to do it right.

markets go up and down. they cant forever go up. It'll be okay guys. It has done this before. It will go back up.

@Snarkysnake: I would refer you to my earlier post in this thread. Leaving is a great idea, but many people simply waited too long to be able to leave now.

Housing isn't the only expensive commodity in So Cal.

Perhaps some kind of government sponsored relocation program would help? Just an added choice or two to our current foreclosure assistance plan. I think you should have a choice between help fixing your mortgage or help relocating. This would certainly balance out the market in a hurry.

@hi: Combine an arrogant attitude, ignorance, and a lack of readhing comprehension and what do you get?

Your comment.

Congratulations.

The really hilarious (and I'm talking sad hilarious) part is that southern california is rife with tent towns - their occupants being illegal immigrants who's only bad decision was to come out of a womb in a shitty country rather than a rich one.

Now there are white people who bought more than they can afford living in camps because they couldn't afford their mcmansion lifestyle, and the BBC goes "OH NOEZ!"

Population of the tent city: 400

Population of the Los Angeles Metropolitan area: 20 million.

Status of story: vastly overblown.

My wife and I are responsible homeowners age 59 with some credit card debt and a credit score well above 700. As of July 2007 we both had well paying jobs. We put our grown son thru a private university.

The end of July 2007 I had a brain tumor operation and then a 2nd brain operation because of some complications. I needed numerous (expensive) MRIs. We have excellent employer health insurance from wife's job so far but have not received the final bills from the surgeries (a lot of smaller paid claims though.

We paid off the house but maintain a home equity loan. I almost died but am recuperating and may return to my job very soon and my wife remains at her well-paying job. However, I will not be the least surprised when we get the surgery bills and I will lose everything we ever worked fro including our house and savings and have to move into either our car (paid off on time) or one of these new tent cities or homelessness on the streets.

In retrospect, we should have been born with old wealth and not worried about any of these as we sail on some cruise. But, instead we may get to retire in a tent city and live cheaply until my Social Security kicks in at age 66 assuming we are still in good health. Middle class isn't all what its cracked up to be after a health crises out of the blue. But, hey that kind of thing can only happen to us not someone like any of you right ?

My grandfather was actually born in a tent.

My great-grandfather was a coalminer and they lived in an old classic company town. Shortly before my grandfather was born, the coalminers went on strike. Of course, all the strikers got kicked out of their homes. Most of them had recently immigrated and were very much alone in this country aside from immediate family. With noplace else to go, they set up a shantytown and shared tents just outside of the company town. And that's where my grandfather was born.

The company broke the strike by bringing in cheaper labor in the form of African-American workers from the south who then were moved into the recently vacated homes. Whatever you hadn't managed to take with you from your home now belonged to the company or to the new resident family.

When my first child was born, my grandfather gave me a rocking chair that was a wedding present given to my great-grandparents that was one of the few things they were able to hold onto.

Sorry about the ramble. Now, can we get back to stories about people having to show receipts, getting told where the Big and Tall section is, and other assorted retail tragedies?

@Snarkysnake: These people may never have had enough money to pick up and move elsewhere--they were probably spending every spare dime on their mortgages. You had somewhere to move to--maybe these people are Calif. natives and this is their home. I can't imagine they would be welcomed in any southern U.S. community if they showed up broke and decided to pitch a tent while they got their lives back together. If people were that welcoming, there would be no homelessness or poverty to begin with.

Does the idyll you returned to have jobs for all, or is that why houses are going begging for $175K? For instance, OKC has some of the cheapest housing in the country, but there are no jobs, and the few there are pay less than $9/hour. In the Northeast, there may be jobs, but there is no affordable housing. I visited friends there and saw people living 4, 5 and 6 to an ancient, drafty house or apartment, each of them paying over $700 a month. There are no U.S. communities where there is a paradise of decent/high wages, job availability, low cost-of-living, and easy access to housing.

It doesn't cost much more to live in a tent in SoCal or in Arkansas. The problem is that people have to live in tents at all. It is clueless of you to think that people would actually "choose" such a thing. They had no choices to begin with, and they clearly didn't have the same choices you did. You cannot use only your own experiences and circumstances to draw conclusions about others' lives--it's poor analysis. You need to do what the BBC did, and actually ask the people what has happened to them. Moreover, these kinds of crises usually sneak up on people bit by bit--they never thought that they would not be able to afford their mortgages, and for a long time, they could--but then one day, they couldn't anymore. Or, they suffered some sort of financial crisis, like a lost job or an illness, and had nowhere to turn for help.

@ChuckECheese: What you describe is a problem with expectations. Two incomes may not provide the expected standard of living, so people need to adjust their spending habits. It all goes back to personal responsibility which, unfortunately, often seems a cold-hearted thing to say. But nobody ever said that medicine tastes good.

The majority of bankruptcies have a debt element in addition to health or other life crises. Still, redhand32's comment shows that otherwise responsibile people may be at risk. But it's not the type of risk (breadthwise) that would fill tent cities around teh country. I think the BBC story is misleading becuase this patricular tent city does not represent the subprime crisis. Rather, it shows that there are many hard-luck reasons (and bad decisions, yes) that put people out of their homes.

@ChuckECheese:
Tis true. I wish more people understood on a broader scale what in fact is happening and not basing their opinion on anecdotal evidence or even worse, how THEY live their lives.

Meaning - "i live like X on Y salary so, they should too! What's the problem!?"

The idea that one false move on your health can destroy everything you've worked for is insane.

This is not excuse the dunderheads that have no concept of how money works and saving and spending etc. It's all going hand in hand here.

@Bladefist: Yes, although the last time it did this -- the last time we had a national decline in average real estate prices -- was during the Great Depression. That's not in living memory for many of the people this is happening to.

If you combine what is know as the Inland Empire (Riverside, San Bernardino Metro Area), with the LA area, the population is over 20 million. This is a few dozen homeless that have been there for years. I see them all the time on my way to work.

You know, I've not been paying a whole lot of attention to these threads as of late, it seemed like these types of threads would devolve to the same posts (almost verbatim) each time (who is to blame; the evil administration, stupid homeowners, bad luck, poor health, etc.), so I stopped reading them, so I ask this: has anyone suggested a solution to the problem? Low interest loans, bailouts, debt forgiveness?

Just curious.

@corrosive:

they been there for quite a LONG time...even when the economy was good.

@Peeved Guy: Too late for that now. The easy credit caused a bubble in house prices, which led to overbuilding as speculators tried to cash in. The housing market will not recover until the oversupply of homes is used up. Of course, the problem is no one wants to have a depreciating asset as collateral, so it's hard to get financing to buy those houses.

Basically I think any bailout attempt is just damage control, and only time will cure this one.

Most of them could not afford a home to begin with, but our "helpful" government determines that our banks should lend money to those who can't afford to pay the bill and they wonder why it exploded in their faces? If the banks were left alone and not forced to follow insane government mandates, then we might not have the looming economy bust. Dollar based on nothing, Central Bank not controlled by the government, government funding departments and entitlement programs that are wasting billions every year, and Congressmen who constantly destroyed our nation with many Presidents' help. Tax cuts have helped keep many families and business alive and anyone who believes that more taxes will solve everything is smoking some bad stuff....

@thebaron: I think a central bank not controlled by the government is a feature, not a bug. If it were government controlled, it would be open to political manipulation. The last thing the economy needs is people running for office based on promises of interest rate cuts.

@Orv: I'll be honest I haven't done indepth research of the current situation versus the past. But I do know that you can manipulate data to make it appear to look comparable with the great depression. Look around you, do you see anything even similiar to the depression? The media is going crazy over this, but thats just politics. I'm guessing if you take the data, and compare apples to apples, our economy is not doing anything out of the ordinary. I wasn't alive during the depression, but if this is similar to the 'Great Depression,' then our ancestors are girly men.

@thebaron: preach on!