Homeowners smug no more

To be honest, maybe we were just a little too smug.

After all, we were the nation's homeowners, and we believed we deserved the riches and comforts that came with the title.

We didn't sit on our hands in our rented apartments while our friends and family turned no down payment into undreamt-of riches. No, we ran the numbers, figured out the leverage and realized that homeownership was a can't-lose deal. So we applied for mortgages, and lenders let us borrow huge sums of money. We bought homes, made investments in real estate and celebrated as prices skyrocketed.

We believed we'd earned our spacious backyards, three-car garages, fourth bathrooms and fifth bedrooms. We'd grabbed the brass ring, won the grand prize. We were better than all those other fools who hadn't had the guts or the green or whatever else it took to buy a home. We risked little or nothing, and we gained everything and then some. Sure, we were smug. We thought we had every reason to be so.

We believed there was an American Dream and we were living it. We believed we had equity, so we refinanced and borrowed against it. We remodeled and enlarged our homes, and we spent the difference on college educations for our children, romantic second honeymoons, big-screen TVs and humongous SUVs. Sure, those big cars guzzled gas, but they allowed us to feel like we owned the road as well as the neighborhood.

Some of us really hit the jackpot and got it all: the bigger house; the better education; the more exotic vacation; the better car; and all the other toys we could grab. And even after we'd gorged ourselves on consumer goods, we still believed we had a comfortable cushion put aside for a rainy day.

Sure, we were smug. We felt like we'd found the pot of gold at the end of our very own personal lucky rainbow. We were homeowners with a capital H. ...CONTINUED

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