Homeownership!

I deal with folks buying new homes everyday, it is gratifying to help them achieve the "American Dream".  Unfortunately,  with the economic downturn, we have seen our share of foreclosures and short sales.  
Perhaps our "American Dream" has lost touch with reality.  Due to the recent hurricane and fears of future hurricanes homeowners insurance rates are going through the roof with all carriers.  Why, in a large part because of roofs.  In our small office we paid out over $2,000,000  during Hurricane Irene with most of that being for roofs. Honestly, a lot of those roofs we replaced should have been replaced by the homeowners years ago but do to our culture/economic/tax system/government programs alot of us have homes that , if we are fortunate enough to be able to afford the 30 year mortgage payment, we can't afford to maintain.

Here is an interesting editorial that speaks to this subject as well as a couple of others.  http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2011-06-30-lessons-for-America_n.htm


Hope my Libertarian tendencies don't offend anyone!