Re: Bartels on Frank, etc.
Jim Devine wrote:
On 3/8/06, Doug Henwood dhenwood@panix.com wrote:
I think the official line on this is more or less correct - that poorer people bought lots of houses in the 1990s and early 2000s, despite high and rising prices. The reason: very low downpayments and innovative” mortgages (less than interest-only, for example). <
Didn’t the Clinton administration make a big effort to encourage home
ownership and congratulate itself on its success?
Yup. Back during the Clinton years, I got a letter from an LBO subscriber in California who worked at a housing agency. They’d just gotten briefed by someone in the admin about how they were encouraging homeownership through 0-5% downpayments. My correspondent thought this was reckless & scary, but little did either of us know at the time that it would become a pervasive national mania.
Doug