Stress is normal, stress is good, we keep on hearing these words from mind specialists all the time.
What I cannot get is why do people choose a stress they could very well live without, like the stress of a mortgage? It sounds strange, but I’ve read this piece of news which says that mortgage approvals increase. If approvals increase, I would assume that also the number of applicants increases.
As I see it, there is a mentality problem here. Leaving aside a First Time Buyer Mortgage, which I can understand up to a point, I really don’t get how somebody can be so irresponsible to put a mortgage on their house, thus endangering the shelter of a whole family, only to get to satisfy some needs which are artificially created by the society we live in.
The idea is this: OK, you need more money to live the life you want. Very well, go and produce more money. Lending it solves the problem only on short term, because additionally you’ll also have to pay the monthly installments of your mortgage. And you didn’t have enough money in the first place, did you? Now you are even deeper in debt and this is the way you’ll go.
Did you know that only in UK, there are about 75,000 mortgage approvals every month? If all those people would downgrade a bit their lifestyle, nobody would notice, as they would still be on the same level. But who’s going to persuade them all?
3 Comments
Over here in America, we have experienced material prosperity on a scale never seen before. Because it’s been one long trend upwards, it’s been easy to live irresponsibly with minimal stress. I think the trend will change as taxpayers finally have to foot the bill for the billions of entitlements promised to previous generations.
It’s not going to be pretty.
Yes, Aaron, America was in a lucky position. People in countries like mine still have to struggle for living. I’ve read some statistics that about 10% of them don’t even afford to buy bread every day.
Stress is good? Never knew there was anything good in stress, but I wonder what that good is. People who put mortgage on their houses think they are wise while you think otherwise. Different strokes for different folks, I guess?