I think we are all aware of the skid that are economy in the US is on. There are many out of work and foreclosures left and right and the cost of living is on the rise. No doubt many Americans are feeling the pinch on their wallets and the politicrats in Washington are coming up on an election year– this is a very dangerous situation.

Seven years ago, I bought my first house in Phoenix, AZ and at the time, mortgage lenders were throwing around money. Not only were there $0 down loans, but lenders were allowing second mortgages on homes in excess of 110% of the properties estimated value. When I started looking for a home, I consulted with a friend who was a mortgage broker and he said I could probably get a loan for up to $300,000. I could not imagine that could be the case, but he assured me that with my job history and my stellar credit (something like 770 at the time) I could do just about anything.

Alarms went off in my head, something had to be wrong, but he assured me that there were people making less that I did with credit in the toilet being cleared for $250,000. Being the pragmatic person that I am, I went out and bought a home for $115,00… just about the cheapest quality home I could find in the area I wanted to live. At the time, man of my friends told me I was crazy to live in an area the had higher crime and “lesser quality” neighbors. The wanted me to live twenty miles away in their gated communities as they we certain that the value of their new homes would rise faster than my 1970s ranch home just outside of the city.

I was certain that I didn’t want to live in a new home. I had heard too many horror stories about community regulations and fines… nothing I had any desire to deal with. While I didn’t put anything down on the home, I did pay for all of the costs of the sale and I was off running the race of a homeowner.

During the next five years I knew man people that bought and sold. In Phoenix, the real-estate market began to take off and people were buying and selling with reckless abandon. They would move from one home and upgrade to something new, trading in equity for marble countertops and stainless steel appliances. Who wouldn’t? The mortgage lenders made it easy, making “creative” loans that made mortgage payments for expensive homes easier to manage.

I talked with a few friends that helped me understand their logic. Hey, get an interest only lone for five years, live in the house for two years (just long enough to avoid taxes on the profit) and upgrade again. The thought was that they could just live in the cycle forever getting increasingly more and more spectacular houses. I didn’t buy it. The market was growing across the board and if their $200,000 was worth $300,000 in two or three years, certainly the grander house was increasing value at the same rate, thus negating all the expected profit on the increase in value.

When we debated it, I explained that based on my understanding, the only way to profit in this way would be to:

1. buy only fixer-uppers so that sweat equity can be factored in… or
2. sell your house in the growing Phoenix market and buy your next house in market with less growth, say, somewhere in Idaho.

Friends swore up and down I was wrong and told me I was foolish for not “moving up” to something bigger and better. But I was fine where I lived. It was a blue collar neighborhood with no community regulations and only a mile from my office. Sure there was crime where I lived, my house was broken into once and so was my brand new truck just a few days from the dealer lot. But crime happened to other people in wealthier areas, but with the addition of a burglar alarm on my house and truck, I figured the benefits of owning a home where I lived was better than risking a dodgy housing market that was willing to loan money to people two years out of bankruptcy.

I knew someone who bought a $300,000+ home and they were one of the worst credit risks I knew– I wouldn’t lend them $100 if they asked. I guess in some way I was a little jealous, here I was someone who worked hard and earned good money who lives in a less desirable location than someone who shouldn’t even own a house, somehow that seemed wrong.

Add to my experience, that I had several friends who were mortgage brokers who work primarily in high-risk loans. They told me often about how they are constantly lending to people who they know will loose their house in a year or so. Just talking with them, they could tell how bad a risk they were, but they found people to loan them money. Mostly on ARMs and interest only loans that they knew they couldn’t afford once the balloon payment came.

I figured that there were plenty of balloon payments coming due in five years, and I didn’t want to be a part of that. Yes, it was tempting when banks would offer me $10-15,000 in equity loans… yes, borrow over 110% of your houses value… I almost rationalized taking out such a loan to pay off debt and upgrade my home… but I am glad I didn’t.

Eventually, the heyday was over. Investors had flooded Phoenix and driven home values up so high, that most people couldn’t resist taking out a second mortgage to play with the free money. I watched it happen and everything in my gut knew something bad was going to happen, things like that just don’t go on forever. Eventually, the bubble burst.

Phoenix was one of the overheated markets that preceded the housing market crash. There was once a time in Phoenix, when there were no more that 300 homes available to purchase, within one year that list was 13,000. Suddenly, all of those people who used those great loans to by an investment, needed to sell their homes, and there weren’t enough buyers in the market to buy them. Housing values tumbled, beginning with the most expensive homes, and people began to panic.

Soon, people began to learn that housing values had fallen. That $250,000 fix-up home with $30,000 worth of improvements is only worth $250,000 and that $30,000 investment has been eaten up by the loss in value. People began to default on their loans. All those investment properties hit the market, because rental values began to tank as well. It was just after the bubble burst that I sold my home in Phoenix. Because I had purchased at the lower end of the market and I had held equity more valuable than dreams, I was able to undercut the market and sell my home within 3 days of listing it. Houses in my area were so over inflated that I had 10 solid offers, 3 of which were asking price plus.

I ended up escaping the Phoenix bubble. As fate would have it, the person that owns my house now, can’t sell it for what I sold it for, they are trapped in it until they can pay some equity into it or housing values climb again. I ended up moving to Nashville, where the market was healthy and the value of the dollar goes further. When I first moved, I almost bought a house that was worth more than the house I owned in Phoenix… I say almost because I didn’t buy that house. I bought something much cheaper.

I looked at my money and my future, and realized that I didn’t want to be a person that spent my life servicing debts, so I paid off my debts, did some charitable giving, helped some that needed helping and bought the cheapest house that I could find.

Today, I am happy. I am not caught in that mortgage debacle. I invested in something I could afford and valued equity over any other possessions I could acquire. But I, unfortunately, was in the minority. Many people in America overbought. I have had several friends in crisis, some of which ended up in foreclosure. This makes me sad– they bought the hype. Instead of looking at the facts they trusted the marketing and some are paying dearly for it.

This brings me to the subject of this blog. Our government is watching the tanking mortgage market, stock market and the struggling economy and trying to figure out what to do. Recently, the government had to reach in with the FDIC and protect some banks that were bankrupt. As defaults on bad mortgages rise, and the bank’s assurity in steady housing values fail to provide insurance, financial institutions are reaching crisis mode.

Today, not only defaults on loans growing, but banks are wary of lending money that has any sort of risk attached. Housing is more affordable than it has been in years, but people can’t get loans to get into those homes. Enter the Federal Government. Seeing how much wealth was gained in those overheated years, they can’t help but see how much the collapse of that business has harmed the economy and they think they have a fix for the problem. Bailout all some of those companies that made bad loans.

What? Why would the government make a move to ensure that businesses that can’t compete in this market are still players? Sure, these foreclosures hurt, but many of those foreclosures are occurring on loans that should never have been made in the first place. Is it the fault of the home-buyer that they bought more house then they could afford? Yes. Even if it was because the believed the hype? Yes. If a bank has defaults and it closes, who’s fault is that? The bank. Why does the government need to prevent a normal market shakeout?

Sure it is painful, and yes, if I was in foreclosure, I would be happy that someone else was able to bail me out of a bad decision, but that doesn’t make it right. In my opinion, this move is really, really bad. All it does is prevent people who have made a bad business decision from experiencing the results of the bad business. In my opinion, it is like the US Government standing outside of a casino rebating people the money that they lost inside. Losing is part of what makes businesses better or at least allows those who do things better to win.

This reminds me of all of the insurance bailouts that happen after every major catastrophe. A hurricane his a major city and billions of damage occurs. Suddenly, a company who has taken people’s money for years says it cant afford to pay the losses. The government steps in a lets that company survive. Let the company survive, because what would we do without them? We would adapt and overcome like we always do.

Let Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae crash and burn and let the economy reel and let millions of people hurt. After such a bad experience, it wouldn’t be too soon that they would let that happen again. Sure, we as a nation would feel much better and still be drugged by the thought that we don’t need to look out for ourselves because Uncle Sam is doing it for us. Let the chips fall where they may. If a company makes a bad decision and crashes and burns for it, let it happen. Sure there will be residual fallout and collateral damage, but that is the circle of life.

In America, we used to tout the idea of free enterprise. The more our Government intrudes into that, the more mucked up it gets. Free enterprise has its own checks and balances, if someone isn’t doing something right or is missing something that people need, then someone else will come along and do it, that is what makes a fee market work.

Today, the government is looking to step in and help prop up a company that contributed to decisions that created this problem in the first place. This is not small action, $700 billion dollars is $2,333 from every American, or between $5,000 - $7,000 from every tax paying American! Does this sound right? Who is this helping? This is way too much money to treat lightly. If you oppose the waste of money in Iraq, you can’t possibly support this bailout. If you believe in fiscal responsibility you can’t support it. If you believe in the principles of the free market you can’t support it.

I say let it all burn. Let this house of cards fall, then maybe Americans will wake up and decide to take their futures into their own hands and not let it be dictated by phony marketing and politicrats. Wake up America, call your legislators and demand the rationalization behind such a reckless unamerican act!

UPDATE 9/26

I just learned that many banks were forced by government policy to provide sub-prime (risky) loans. While I don’t endorse to political slant of the following, it includes a great deal of important information about the mortgage “crisis”:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5tZc8oH–o

I have only recently regained an appreciation for the beach vacation. For many years, I disliked the beach– well, not the beach per se, but the “beach experience” that involves being half naked and exposed for long periods of time to the sun. I am not sure if my dislike began as a result of the many childhood sunburn miseries or because of the fact that, half naked, I look like the Pillsbury dough boy in swim trunks… perhaps a combination of the two. Maybe it began sometime about fourth grade, when I began to wear t-shirts swimming… partially because of sunburn prevention and partially to conceal my growing pasty white belly.

Regardless of how and why, I mostly resisted going to the beach until two years ago, when I returned to Phoenix in order to drive my VW bug to Nashville, and had a nearly religious experience. Early on my last morning in Phoenix, I got up and decided to jump into my fiend’s pool for an early morning swim. The water was cool and refreshing and the sun was just beginning to peak above the rooftops. I moved to the edge of the pool and pulled myself half way out of the water directly into the suns rays. For nearly twenty minutes, I rested there reclined as the sun rose and began to warm me. For the first time in my memory I enjoyed the combination of water and sun in a truly thankful way.

At that moment, my mood was even worshipful, as I appreciated God’s love for me in the warming rays. Now when I think of that moment, a verse from the Old Testament (Malachi 4:2) comes to mind. “… the sun of righteousness will arise, with healing in his wings.” In those few moments I experienced some healing, and afterward, I began to think much more enjoyably about the sun and surf; so, when I am tired and burned out, I often find myself having a longing for that special kind of healing.

For the last 3 months, I have been working on the television show Nashville Star, which, with its 12 hour work days, really beat me up. Add to that beating the fact that my girlfriend Kim and I were working opposite schedules that didn’t allow us to see each other very often, compounded even further by the fact that she was losing her apartment of 15 years and had to sell, chuck, move or give away a large volume of belongings, and (the worst part… for me) the need to actually move things from the 5th floor apartment during the hottest and most humid part of the summer, at the same time we are being needed for in the Nashville Star finale.

By the time Kim was moved and the show ended, we were both severely beat up physically and emotionally and in need of a vacation. Lucky for both of us, Kim’s family holds its annual beach reunion every year in August. This year, it landed perfectly at the end of Nashville Star. A month or so ago, I got the invitation to be included in the family event, an opportunity to meet Kim’s family was something I was ready for, especially if it meant a week-long vacation at the beach.

So, here I sit on day 3, a nice breeze is blowing, the sky is a bit hazy, but the weather is excellent. Humidity is low, the temperature is warm and the pool is cool. Between the beach, the pool, the seafood buffets and an enjoyable family dynamic, I am in hog heaven. The only bummer, it the intermittent Internet signal I can pirate from the condos next door. But ultimately, who cares about the Interwebs or the Olympics when you have the sun of righteousness arising with healing in his wings, just waiting with open arms to calm, warm and revive you.

What I hope follows this entry, is a series of blogs that offers a day-by-day summary of the healing.

In some way, I think I need to exercise the demons of these ideas, so, they don’t continue to plague me. So, here will be my attempt at some micro-blogging– a blog title and a single paragraph of bloggering:

 I Enjoy Being Missed…

Occasionally, my world is viewed from a very negative perspective, and often I see the things around me as a litany of things that can, and possibly will, go wrong. Today is not one of those days. Everyday, when I leave my job, I have to take a short walk through a nature path to get to the parking lot where my truck is parked. I often enjoy this walk, as the path is lined with trees and a manicured garden which often causes me to walk a little slower than normal in order to take in the beauty of the man-polished nature. On this particular day, I was walking and noticed a couple walking toward me, so, I shifted to my right in order to allow them to pass comfortably. This was a very lucky happenstance, for as fate would have it, just as I shifted to my right, I heard a series of large splashes to my immediate left. I turned quickly to witness the source of the splashes, as a very large bird-turd splattered the sidewalk beside me creating a fourth splash. As I considered how my day may have begun, had I been the target of those droppings, I couldn’t help but think, how much I enjoyed being missed.

Ok, that wasn’t that bad, it may not have been a true “micro-blog” but, for someone like myself, who is usually prone to writing epic blogs, that was pretty micro.

At the moment, I am sitting in a room at the end of a long hallway of a large Hotel, keeping an eye on the cast of this next season of Nashville Star. They are all asleep, and I am killing time listening to a preview copy of my brother’s new record, Swallow the Sea, and feeling a need to create something. Over the last few years, my creative energy seems to direct out of writing, and what easier way to write than to dump something into the blogosphere.

The last six months have seen many changes in my life… like my attempt at a serious relationship, running out of money, learning to trust in God for my living, working in television production, making new friends, becoming an uncle again, witnessing suffering, attempting to experience and build community with my neighbors, watching God work in other’s lives around me, abandoning old personal issues and concepts… did I already mention learning to trust God, yeah, that has been a big one.

For someone who wants to know the details, learning to live life one day at a time has been a real challenge. But luckily, I haven’t had to do it on my own. Having my girlfriend, Kim, in my life has helped me take a new perspective on many things that I thought had been set in stone. In a way, she has helped me tap into the Paul of my youth, the one with dreams and a spirit of adventure… the one that loved laughing and found energy by being with other people. Helping me also to rediscover a God who is living and operative… who loves me and desires good things for me– a concept that experientially died in me long ago, when I chose to embrace theology and doctrine over a life of faith in love.

Right now, I am sitting in a chair, staring down a long hallway, waiting for signs of life. A housekeeper is making her rounds, and the cast is beginning to stir. I don’t know what the day holds for me, perhaps some adventure, perhaps just some rest. I need to return to my job, so I’ll close my brain dump for now. Hopefully, I have arced the last six months and future bloggings will come with more regularity.

Here’s to hoping

I still haven’t made my first film and have have a trail of unfinished scripts and undeveloped stories that litter the path I have traveled over the last year, but I am so much closer to my dream than I have ever been at any time in my life. “Hurry up and wait,” is what that they said in the Army– a motto frequently relived on nearly every set I’ve been on over the last year. If you want to pursue a life in visual storytelling, it is something you have to be in for the long-haul, something I am having to consider as I recognize the first anniversary of my “creative hiatus,” and look forward at the future.

I have been living mostly on savings I set aside for my hiatus, but that money is now on it’s last leg and soon I will join the ranks of starving artist… now I am forced to ask myself if I am in it for the long haul. I can go back to software development and get paid lots of money for something that sucks the life and joy out of me, or I can take a risk and chase my dream into the dark places. At the moment, my mind is not made up, and the coming days will be filled with weighty considerations.

While I stew on my future, I am preparing to spend Thanksgiving with a bunch of friends that I have known less than a year, they irony is they all have some filmmaking connection to me. As I begin to consider the possibility of stepping, even temporarily, out of my pursuit of a film career, I am saddened. In nearly fifteen years I have not had such a sense of community and the indications of genuine friendship than I do now with the small circle of friends that I have developed over the last year.

I guess this only makes sense, as I have come to believe sincerely that that greatest asset in filmmaking is not what you have, but who you know. Developing friendships and building relationships are somethings that are at the core of this form of art. By it’s nature, it is collaborative and requires the participation of many people that you have to trust in.

I don’t have any idea what the next year holds for me, whether I will chase my dream or abandon it– I don’t think that really matters to me. What has been the greatest pleasure over the last year, has been meeting so many wonderful people, all with their own dreams and ambitions. While I would love to dive deeper into filmmaking I look forward more to the collaborations and relationship-building that are such an important part of the process.

However, I still struggle with my faith and how is meshes with a career in an industry that is filled with Godlessness and self-glory. Regardless of what I “think” about it all, I keep being led by circumstances an opportunities back into the film path. This has caused me to consider how such a career can permit me to “do all to the glory of God,” and I am continually brought back to the focus on relationships in this industry and how little the final film product has to do with it.

At the moment, I simply look to the Lord to open or close doors according to His will. My part in the whole thing is to be a person within whom God is working and speaking. There are many people who believe that the best way to proclaim the gospel is with words and teachings, I personally think that the best way (for me) to preach the gospel, is by living. If we segregate the world into believers and unbelievers we prevent the world from meeting God… God-by-proxy, as I recently described it to a friend.

What better way is there to “do all to the glory of God,” then to represent Him in every corner of life. Why confine the gospel to certain places, methods and situations? I don’t want to compromise who and what I am; I think this is one reason that I want to make my own films and tell my own stories. But until I am doing that, I need to be God-by-proxy while carrying lights, hauling equipment, running the camera and building relationships by genuinely caring about people.

No one can tell me what this next year holds for me, but I look forward to it, partially due to the uncertainty. This thought causes me to remember a quote from Watchman Nee:

If God leads you to walk a way that you know, it will not benefit you as much as if He would lead you to take the way that you do not know. This forces you to have hundreds and thousands of conversations with Him, resulting in a journey that is an everlasting memorial between you and Him.

I look forward to the conversations while on this journey.