Bad news on the radio

When you travel across the country, as my family and I did the last two weeks, you hear a mishmash of radio stations. Some stay in range for a mile or two, some for half a state. This gave me a good chance to hear what people from Chicago to southern Virgnia had to say about the state of the housing market.

The verdict? Not surprisingly, it wasn’t pretty.

I heard phone calls on talk radio from people on the verge of losing their homes to foreclosure. I heard experts theorize on the financial problems being faced by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, the country’s two mortgage giants. I heard other experts blame the failure of large bank IndyMac largely on that company’s mortgage unit.

Basically, no matter what station we drove into, the news was the same: The housing slump is deep, and it’s hurting everyone.

My hope is that something good does eventually come out of our country’s housing troubles: Maybe the next time there’s a big housing boom, we’ll all be careful — homebuyers, sellers, real estate agents, mortgage lenders, government officials — and take steps to prevent homes from rising in value too quickly and to stop mortgage lenders from giving away money too easily.

We’ve all seen the pain that our current housing slump is causing. Let’s hope we’ve also learned some lessons.