The American "Dream of Home Ownership" as Nightmare

That the conception of middle classness prevailing in America today is profoundly debased cannot be overstated enough. In place of the independent "Old" middle class today's "New" middle class are just a bunch of working stiffs answering to bosses as they live their whole lives in the shadow of being fired or laid off and thus reduced to pauperism, just like the rest of the working class they do not care to admit to being part of, with their student debt perhaps purchasing them a little more material comfort and security during the time in which they are they are working--a health plan, the ability to afford a few more things. Meanwhile the attempt to, if not extend this debased "middle classness" then at least provide the broader population with its benefits--on the basis of rising living standards and social programs--did not get very far before stalling out with the fizzling of the highly anomalous post-war boom, after which what little progress American society had made to that end increasingly looked hollow. Rather than even trying to provide the public the benefits of middle classness they simply encouraged it to think of itself as middle class, and behave in middle class ways, however little relevance those ways had to the practicalities of its life, because of the desirability of this from the standpoint of their political objectives. (To be "middle class" in thought and conduct is to be conformist, individualistic, moralizing--conservative; more fearful of those below one than resentful of those above one in the social scale, indeed eager to preserve the privileges of the elite in the generally deluded expectation that they will join them and share in those privileges; and in times of societal stress and polarization look not to the left but the right in that way that has ever made a frightened or ruined middle class the backbone of reactionary and fascist movements; all to the advantage of the status quo.)

The debased, strained, fraudulent character of the middle classness I describe here is especially evident in the area of home ownership. This is not because I see anything wrong with people owning a home. Quite the contrary, nothing can be more natural than the desire to have shelter one cannot be kicked out of, not be at the mercy of a landlord (the feudal ring of which word is all too appropriate), especially in so cruelly insecure a society as this one. Indeed, if there was much in Forster's Howard's End that I didn't care for, I have always been sympathetic to Helen Schlegel's cri de coeur "Can what they call civilisation be right, if people mayn’t die in the room where they were born?"--all as, so long as our present notions of family have any meaning, it seems to me only right that every family have a "seat" somewhere, where in bad times its members can all be expectant of welcome.

But just how much does the prevailing character of home ownership actually give us all these things? As it does with so many other things the social arrangements we see business and its cronies in government and the media use romantic images of home ownership to suck people into a colossal, vicious grift. Certainly the desire for personal security and freedom, to have stability and continuity in one's life, to maintain family connections, runs far, far counter to the ceaseless enjoinment of the purveyors of financial "advice" to the public to think of their home not in any of these terms, but as an investment above all, the human needs of the home buyer irrelevant, as they speak glibly of second mortgages, reverse mortgages and the rest, the more in as the self-proclaimed masters of the universe securitize all these and make derivatives of the securities and traffic in those too because just collecting the interest on a mortgage just isn't enough for the usurers of our time.

The betrayal of all that home ownership should mean is that much more painful in a context where the Great God Market offers the customer not "what the people want" but what the overlords of the Finance-Insurance-Real Estate (FIRE) sector want to "sell" them, with this meaning mortgage payments bound to be beyond what they can afford for decades, with the trend not running in their favor on a home shoddily built, and so not just high-maintenance but difficult to maintain, leaving the already overburdened buyer on the hook for that much more consumption of home repair services as every house proves a money pit--while all this only deepens their entanglement in the loathsome credit system, which is another win for the aforementioned overlords (because as the acronym "FIRE" shows, Finance and Real Estate are inseparable). Meanwhile, in return for all this they will probably live under the thumb of a Home Ownership Association or condo board which with its fees, rules, physical intrusions into a home that is not their castle and general high-handedness make even those who own their homes free and clear and owe arrears to no one feel less like owners than tenants, or even squatters, while residing on their own property. One should also not forget the ways in which the demand has had microeconomic consequences feeding the ever-worsening creditism-fueled speculative frenzy that "financialization" has made the basis of the economy in our time, to the cost of the many (else one would not see so many taking out second mortgages and reverse mortgages). All of which means that the "homeowner" is ever menaced by the vultures of private equity, ever ready to seize on any chance to snap up their property cheap to start the racket all over again, as said "homeowner" must now find somewhere else to live, plunging them back into the wretchedness of the housing market. (Just ask Florida condo owners about how things have gone for them since the Surfside building collapse.)

Yes, a colossal, vicious grift is what it is, the "homeowner" getting the "personal responsibility" of home ownership without the benefits in a situation that is heaven for the rich, purgatory for the (very small, genuine) middle class, and HELL ON EARTH for everyone else. Indeed, looking at the reality of the situation it seems all too clear that there is something to be said for alternatives to ownership--like a healthy rental market. But of course, such a possibility is ruled out by the economy being one big casino, for as Daniel Thorn told Adrian Monk in the casino business the first rule, the golden rule, the only rule, is that the House always wins--as the house buyer almost always loses.