re: Is "walking away" from a mortgage wrong?

quote:

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No. Not at all. It's a business transaction and it is the responsibility of the bank to underwrite appropriately for the risks. Bankruptcy is basically a put option on the loan and that information is known up front by the bank.

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This.

If I rent a building for a year for a business and the business loses money, it is not wrong of me to go under and break the lease. Penalty fees are written into the contract in that case, same deal with mortgage. Foreclosure is factored in. They understand the risk when they loan the money, and frankly, as tight as they are on who can get loans right now, this will be a non-issue once all the old loans that are bad work their way out. You have to be pretty dang solvent to get a loan right now.