I agree, Ex-SD. The writer squarely fingers the 3 primary partners in the crime:
1. Home buyers
2. Mortgage bond investors
3. Middlemen between 1 and 2
The “crime” of this mortgage melt-down could not have been committed without the cooperation of all 3 parties, and most of that cooperation was as knowing and informed as it needed to be to make them fully culpable. [Warning: full rant in progress…]
Even “dumb” home buyers made a very conscious choice to give up renting and buy instead. And that was only partly so they could paint their home purple. You’d never pay your landlord $200,000 for the privilege of painting your rental apartment purple. So you don’t take on the risk of losing $200,000 of your own money to buy a home just so you can paint it purple. Buyers all along were hoping for big windfall gains. And they all along knew they could mail back the keys if it didn’t turn out that way. No one taught them about options, but they smelled that they were being given an incredibly cheap call option.
