What Does a Member of Congress and a former Major League Baseball Player Have in Common?
Answer: Both of them have had their homes foreclosed upon.
Jose Conseco, a former American League MVP, in remarks made on the TV show “Inside Edition”, said that he “walked away from his $2.5 Million Encino home “because it didn’t make financial sense for me to keep paying a mortgage on a home that was basically owned by someone else.” Didn’t make sense to pay his mortgage (hmm) on a home that was basically owned by someone else (Who would that have been? Maybe the bank that lent him the mortgage?).
Meanwhile, USA Today reported that “The credit crunch is hitting the halls of Congress, with reports from California that a member of the House lost her house in foreclosure earlier this month.” Congresswoman Laura Richardson had her home foreclosed upon as a result of borrowing $60,000 out of it for her congressional campaign. She had initially taken out a loan out on her three bedroom home in Sacramento 17 months ago for $535,000 (100% financing), and then borrowed an additional sum bringing the indebtedness to $578,000 when a “Notice of Trustee’s Sale” was published in March of this year. Richardson who earns $169,300 a year as a congresswoman was also reportedly behind on her taxes by almost $9,000. “Washington Mutual ended up writing off nearly $200,000 of that debt to get rid of the home,” according to the Press-Telegram.
What ever happened to the notion of noblesse oblige? The idea of living up to your obligations? If our elected politicians and sports celebrities can walk, then I can certainly balk, or at least blog about it.
