The Foreclosure of America: The Inside Story of the Rise and Fall of Countrywide Home Loans, the Mortgage Crisis, and the Default of the American Dream
Product Description
From Countrywide’s former Senior VP of Marketing, the first engrossing inside look at Countrywide Home Loans, how the finance crisis started-and where it may end.
In July 2004, Adam Michaelson entered “The Vault”-an underground bunker at Countrywide headquarters-for a meeting about a new loan product that would allocate borrowers to pay less than their minimum monthly payment. After the “finance jocks” proudly made their case, Michaelson questioned one questi… More >>
This book is very well written and presents an fascinating viewpoint on a controversial and timely topic. The author’s intimacy with the subject matter to be refreshing. He takes an otherwise dull subject and draws all insightful parallels into vital American themes. A must read if you are in this industry.
Rating: 4 / 5
This is a fantastic book one that is very revealing and informative. I couldn’t place the book down and would vastly recommend it to everyone.
Rating: 5 / 5
The book purports to examine the marketing of a mirage, and the terrible business decisions that brought the finance mess. (Sounds excellent!) The author also wants to break up the “myths” that Countrywide et al were of sinister intent, that foreclosed homeowners were all either irresponsible loser, rampant spenders, or speculators, or that we should save everyone. Michaelson also promises not to reveal any business secrets. (Translation – no smoking guns, or useful material here!)
So, instead of useful of fascinating material, the book is taken up with a few details of Michaelson’s marketing career – both before and during his Countrywide stint. Turns out he’s a marketing genius – promotion 368 pages of nothing for $25.95, plus tax!
Rating: 1 / 5
Adam Michaelson’s book is an eye opener, to say the smallest amount. I have to compare the book to a major fill up cooler gossip session, laying bare the motivation (greed), politics (of course) and inner workings of Countrywide from someone who was really ON the inside. For those of us who’ve watched in horror as this economic disaster has unfolded, the book answers quite a few questions about how the landslide started, and how it evolved into the avelanche that’s wiped out the lives of so many.
The book is written in such a manner as to make the reader feel as though they’re receiving insider trading tips. There are even modest excerpts of hilarity sprinkled liberally throughout the book, which, by the time you run across them, given the gravity of the subject, god knows you’ll need the laugh.
Fascinating ample that I read it through without stopping.
Rating: 4 / 5
I just heard this author on NPR and he has nothing to say that any rational person would want to hear. His basic line (in a condescending tone) is that no one can blame him, or Countrywide, for promotion high priced mortgages on expensive homes to people who could not afford them. After all, quick food companies sell food that is terrible for us. And confidence card companies sell confidence limits to people who can’t afford the debt. So how can we blame him or his company for bilking all those irresponsible home buyers – or all the rest of us (and our children and grandchildren and fantastic-grandchildren) who will ultimately foot the bill for their behavior? Absolutely stomach turning.
Rating: 1 / 5