[quote=Coronita]In addition to the ethical dilemma of lying and saying you are going through an economic hardship when you really aren’t, I don’t think the banks simply just give it to you. My understanding is you need to actually provide proof of an economic hardship in order to qualify (IE proof of unemployment, reduced earnings etc)… Even the county’s assessor’s office allows you to apply for a penalty waiver, but you also need to provide proof of an economic hardship.

Second, my understanding is the loan amount you don’t pay simply gets tacked on the end of your loan, and during that time I believe interest is still be charged. I could be wrong about that. Also, unless they changed the terms, some of the loans don’t allow you to tack on the missed payments at the end of the loan. They are due in full after the 3 months.

I generally don’t try to play this sort of game. Maybe because I’m superstitious, but I just think that if you pretend to be going through an economic hardship in order to take advantage of a situation, it always has a mysterious way of coming back and biting you in the ass in some weird way.[/quote]

Trump fucked over 1000s of small contractors [Including my moms buddies husband, a roofer trump just flat out stiffed and sent into bankruptcy!] by not paying and no karmic retribution yet for trump.
And anything short of imprisonment for him and all his kin I’d say will fall short, karmically.

. I’d say its just generally not true that we get bad things directly happen to us when we do bad.

But there are other reasons not to scam the system regardless of whether it helps or hurts u.

Bad things happen to good people.

Good things happen to bad people.

In about equal measure.

If you have to ask along the lines of “is there anything wrong if I were to do this?”, you already have an ethical dilemma. Because if you didn’t, you would just do it and not bother to try do justify your actions because you wouldn’t care.

But that aside, there’s been numerous cases that even people with legitimate reasons to ask for a mortgage forbearance, banks are making those folks jump through hoops to prove there is a financial hit. It’s hardly worth the effort of 2-3 months even if you could jump through those hoops.

If your main concern is having emergency cash on hand, this is probably not the best way to go about this since possibly it’s only good for 2-3 months, hardly enough cash to really bridge a family over for a real recession. There’s better ways to setup an emergency loan, and it’s probably better to do it while you still have a job.

Plenty of people were punished during the last great recession, many of them lost their homes, and some of the rest of us were able to buy at really cheap prices, right? That was during a period were there was irresponsible borrowing… I’m not so sure this type around it’s really about irresponsible borrowing… I think it’s just more about bad luck. How often do we consider a pandemic event. Maybe every 70 years or so?

This event is hitting almost everyone across the board in the service sector that has a job/business that requires any human-human contact that isn’t deemed as “essential”… This isn’t just your hourly restaurant workers, but those business owners, dental offices, gyms, real estate professionals, etc,etc, where there is no online/at home option. It hits low income earners, middle income earners, high income earners, and business owners…arguably punishing business owners more so than workers… I don’t see this as a blanket “irresponsible borrowing” this time around for those impacted. Maybe some, not all or even most.

I had a colleague that that recently had to relocate and rather than stay with us a few months longer, he decided to take a job with another company where he’s moving to..and takes 2 weeks off to relocate…Something anyone would have done if they were relocating. Then the virus hit, and the lockdown orders happened. That other company ended up postponing his start date week by week for 4 weeks. Now, 4 weeks later, he gets a call that they rescinded his offer. He’s screwed now. He doesn’t have a job, he can’t apply for unemployment because he voluntarily left my company. Shit happens.

Fine. Do what you guys want….More power to you.

While you are at it, eat half of that rotisserie chicken you bought at costco, and then return it saying it tastes bad to get your $4.99 back.

Or buy a plant from home depot, plant it, and then before the 1 year mark, if you don’t like it, dig it back up and take it back to home depot and say it didn’t grow well to get your $20 of so back.

Same thing. And other people do it. Why not?

[quote=barnaby33]

While you are at it, eat half of that rotisserie chicken you bought at costco, and then return it saying it tastes bad to get your $4.99 back.

Or buy a plant from home depot, plant it, and then before the 1 year mark, if you don’t like it, dig it back up and take it back to home depot and say it didn’t grow well to get your $20 of so back.

I did both of those just last week!

Leaving aside your point about ethical dilemma, is there a reason not to do it? So far you’ve mentioned the hassle, that is at least real. However if you’re at risk of losing your job in the foreseeable future (as most of us are), then delaying the payment would seem to be a no brainer even if it does cause you to have to make a big decision in 3 months; namely pay it all back, or claim you can’t.

Other options, like getting a HELOC titled now, if possible also seem good. I’m really just trying to illuminate the contours of how to navigate the economic reality of now.

I’ve already lived through one massive episode of the govt fucking me with my own money. I really don’t want to do that again and so maximizing my financial preparedness is a valid process.[/quote]

I opted to get a HELOC loan for the very reason of bridging short term financing needs and emergencies. Imho, while one is still employed, you can easily qualify for some of these loans. But when one is most financially vulnerable after losing a job, banks won’t want to lend you squat. The HELOC I have is no cost, and as long as I don’t use it there’s no fees or interest, and it’s good for about 10 years. The HELOC I have is prime rate – 0.25% and the maximum rate is capped at 8% if we ever see high interest rate environment again. You can probably find something better.

As for the mortgage forbearance, I have no idea what the future implications are, if there are any on refinancing. But if you did have a significant change in household income, then well why not?

[quote=scaredyclassic]definitely not an “ethical dilemma”

“Ethical dilemmas, also known as a moral dilemmas, are situations in which there is a choice to be made between two options, neither of which resolves the situation in an ethically acceptable fashion.”[/quote]

Everything you write speaks do me. I feel like I get it whenever you write it.

speaking of moratorium on evictions. This is an interesting read

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/business/real-estate-news/article242023636.html

[quote] Some landlords may not realize the new federal CARES Act, which was approved by Congress on March 27, applies to them. The law placed a 120-day moratorium on eviction proceedings and interest fees on late rent in buildings that receive any kind of government subsidy or are part of federally backed VA loans and mortgages sold to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac.[/quote]

What if you don’t have any mortgages? seems me that it means the federal moratorium is not applicable. you are still subjected to state and local laws