The big Countrywide bailout
Individual homeowners aren’t the only ones suffering during the mortgage crisis. Some of the nation’s biggest mortgage lenders are feeling some pain, too.
The latest mortgage giant to hit hard times is Countrywide Financial. Once one of the most profitable of all mortgage lenders, Countrywide teetered on the edge of bankruptcy earlier this week. Blame the subprime mortgage lending problems — questionable loans made to borrowers unable to actually pay them back — for Countrywide’s troubles.
Fortunately for Countrywide, Bank of America has swooped in to purchase the lender in a $4 billion stock deal. So Countrywide, it seems, isn’t going anywhere.
It’s a little funny, though, reading about this deal. I often hear from people angry that homeowners who are struggling to make their own monthly mortgage payments would ever get a break from the federal government. Yet here’s a giant corporation getting a $4 billion break of its own — albeit from another corporation and not the federal government — and there’s nary a peep from the same folks who’ve been complaining to me so loudly about help for individual homeowners.
It reminds me of how everyone loves to complain about so-called “welfare mothers,” when corporations themselves are actually the biggest receivers of government assistance.
So, congratulations to Countrywide. Glad you’re able to stick around. But how about a little sympathy toward the homeowners who are still struggling to meet their payments on some of those bad loans you passed out?
