my house (mortgage) during dollar collapse

what will happen when the dollar collapses and i and millions of others can't pay there mortgages ?

You pose an interesting question. There are numerous assumptions one would need to or can make. But for the sake of argument, assuming all income is fixed in dollars and you do not have a adjustable mortgage, your payments would not change. You would continue making and receiving payments in dollars and your mortgage would not be affected. Your biggest worry should be the other commodities you need to buy or pay for like groceries, taxes, energy consumption, etc. The Weimar Republic serves as an excellent example of what happens to a country that prints money without any assets backing the money. For reference go to
http://www.usdebtclock.org/

My mom's parents (she's from Germany) lived through this period and every time she wants to stuff her dollar savings in a savings account I remind her of the Weimar Republic and she drops that thought. It took wheelbarrows of money just to buy simple basic groceries.

Sadly the media and politicians "float" the "deficit" as the most immediate concern when it's the total US debt that strangling U.S.!

Let's assume that someone owes a balance of $100K on their mortgage, and we enter hyperinflation to where it takes $100K just to buy a loaf of bread. Wages will likewise have to go through the roof, and you may be earning $500K or more per day. Under a senerio like this if you can go hungry for one day you can pay off your mortgage with cash.

I'll bet if that ever happened, this state would seize everyone's property. Then we'd have a modern day civil war on our hands, I'm afraid. One can only imagine communist-like things happening all over MA in that type of situation. Just thinking out loud ...

Smitty: ....and that is different from living there today, how?????

Sorry unlikely,

There will be a new dollar worth say 100 old dollars. All existing debt to the govt (they will nationalize realty) will be payable in new dollars. Debts owed you like SS your salary will be still old dollars. That means most of us are broke so realty collapses as nobody can afford it. However, I doubt that will happen as we are the planets reserve policy and if we crash so does the world. So everybody prints money also as we have the nerve to do it too (watch Japan). The trouble is gold and silver are becoming the currency of the debt holders not treasuries, the banksters countered this historically by massive shorting of the PM market and as silver was easiest to manipulate they concentrated there. CBOT futures contracts in the hundreds of thousands were shorted for years. Now there is a short silver raid and it has gone from $18 to $50 and a full on short raid is on. Somebody is going to corner the market but unlike the last time is prepared to take delivery so don't confuse this with the Hunt Bros raid. CBOT will fail to deliver and this will spill over into gold and is the precursor of a currency collapse - we go onto a gold standard whether we like it or not. That means living within our means - let be clue you $4T expenditures will now have to become $1.5T in real short order. So any fix must include the military and entitlements - this will not be pretty. It's coming REAL soon just follow the gold/silver market for an arrival date. Expect much govt bluster, margin changes and perhaps confiscation - all to no avail. So 1980 style devaluation of the dollar from 20-60% and oil/gas will double at least and gold goes to $15,000. the calculation is simple - Fort Knox has 8400 tons, divide M3 by the FK holding assuming the place is not empty (my bet).

Hold onto your hats.

whistlenut wrote:Smitty: ....and that is different from living there today, how?????

Ya got a point there .....

coalnewbie wrote: All existing debt to the govt will be payable in new dollars. Debts owed you like SS your salary will be still old dollars

Man.... that seems like a doomsday stretch like I've never heard....can you give us ONE actual example of that ever happening at any time, any nation..... any?? If that idea were to happen..... Let's see.... Payday is Friday....so each Wed I guess you tell your boss if you want to be paid in old dollars or new dollars, or what percentage of each?

Well Freddy, the number of 100 was pulled out of the sky and in the days of fractional banking I doubt if it would occur. Examples in history? We didn't invent derivatives until about 15 years ago and they only really got going 7 years ago so there are no precedents in history. As there is no history then there is no precedent that makes your guess as good as anybody elses. You are certainly as bright as Bendover and I suspect smarter as you have more common sense. Also nobody has a fix so congress goes home for two weeks as it does not have a clue how to put things right. Another perspective from Barney (Rubble) Frank is don't worry about the debt. I think he is an idiot and has gone very quiet recently but he has a point. For example the UK debt as a fraction of GDP is worse than ours and hidden debt from their banks (which control our banks) perhaps much worse than ours. Obama reports to the Fed that reports to the Rothschilds and you think I am joking? So we are all on the edge of our seats yes? 75% of the US does not care, LIndy Lohan scores much higher than the debt in newsworthyness. So the UK at least is very worried yes? Well no, the hot ticket this spring is new BMWs -selling like hot cakes and we are all just enthralled by the royal wedding and the hot fashion in the US is the stupid hats the Queen wears and the women are copying Kates hairstyles. Well that's in NYC anyway. They wouldn't look good on a lumberjill. Maine has it right, instead of buying the girls $1000 hats you buy them axes and tell them not to come back from the woods until the truck is full. I understand this philosophy as I bought my wife a weedwacker for easter. I need to head North.

Freddy wrote:

coalnewbie wrote: All existing debt to the govt will be payable in new dollars. Debts owed you like SS your salary will be still old dollars

Man.... that seems like a doomsday stretch like I've never heard....can you give us ONE actual example of that ever happening at any time, any nation..... any?? If that idea were to happen..... Let's see.... Payday is Friday....so each Wed I guess you tell your boss if you want to be paid in old dollars or new dollars, or what percentage of each?

In 1923 Germany issued the Rentenmark as a new currency, it took 12 zero's off the old Mark.

It's not much different than the fact that today we use a hundred dollar bill to pay what a twenty paid for 50 years ago. The hundred is the new twenty.

lsayre wrote:Let's assume that someone owes a balance of $100K on their mortgage, and we enter hyperinflation to where it takes $100K just to buy a loaf of bread. Wages will likewise have to go through the roof, and you may be earning $500K or more per day. Under a senerio like this if you can go hungry for one day you can pay off your mortgage with cash.

Is that how things are working today in Zimbabwe?

Jpete, please tell us more. A Dollar is a Dollar, regardless of its purchasing power. The courts in this land (who cares about Zimbabwe and its law, or even if it really has any valid rule of law) have always recognized that a debt is paid when sufficient Dollars are transferred to absolve that debt. The relative purchasing power (value) of that Dollar as measured by comparing it against a basket load of foreign currencies is not considered in any legal setting.

If our Nation's inflation in a given year is 6% annualized, does the balance due on your mortgage rise by 6% in that year? If inflation was 50% annual, would it rise by 50%? And if inflation was 100,000%, would your mortgage balance rise by 100,000%?

No.

But if your food, fuel and taxes all went up 6% a year, I guarantee your pay isn't going to keep up and you aren't going to have a whole lot left to pay the mortgage.

If you don't believe me, take a walk outside and ask your neighbors.

Maybe pick up a newspaper while you are out.

Or stay in and Google "hyperinflation". Zimbabwe is governed by the same law we are. The law of economics. It's kind of like gravity. Very difficult to escape it's effects.