Newsday offers another tale of the “unfortunate” homeowner caught in the subprime mortgage crisis.  But I can’t, for the life of me, comprehend what this person could have been thinking when she got herself embroiled in this mess.

A year ago, Smith-Correa said, she and her husband were able to move into their $235,000 three-bedroom Cape-style home with less than $3,000 down. The couple had to take on two mortgages, one with an interest rate of 13.1 percent, and another at 8.5 percent, that was slated to go up to 8.8 percent, Smith-Correa said. The mortgages the couple signed for then quickly became too expensive, she said.

Smith-Correa said her husband, who works in construction, has had difficulty finding employment, and she’s a stay-at-home mother with five children, ages 4 to 11. “The builders aren’t building, and people can’t afford to have things done on houses, anyway,” she said.

It’s not an expensive house, but they put only $3000 down, which suggests that these were not people awash in savings to begin with.  But the monthly nut, $2,400, was a known quantity.  What were they thinking?  While the husband may have made a decent living doing construction when times were good, it’s still not going to be sufficient to pay the mortgage (plus the taxes on Long Island) and feed 5 kids.  It’s not even in the ballpark.

What I cannot grasp is how someone undertakes a commitment to pay a monthly sum that they simply cannot afford?  I would sincerely appreciate someone explaining to me how such thinking works, because I cannot feel sympathy for someone who entered into a mortgage knowing that they would never be capable of living up to their part of the bargain.

Update:   Orin says “The Bush administration is finalizing details of a plan to rescue thousands of homeowners at risk of foreclosure by helping them refinance into more affordable mortgages backed by public funds.”  To those of us who conducted ourselves in a financially responsible fashion, looks like the jokes on us!  Thanks, Comrade Bush.