On California’s foreclosure front: Losing in La Quinta

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From L.A. Times staff writer Peter Hong:

L.A. Times video journalist Brent Foster and I spent a week on the road visiting some of the places in California hardest hit by the foreclosure crisis.

Many of the foreclosure hotspots are places built on sales to subprime borrowers and first-time homeowners. But there are also plenty of foreclosures in affluent areas, where relatively well-off folks, emboldened by soaring home equity, traded up to more lavish houses they thought would continue to appreciate. Some also had real-estate-related incomes that climbed with the market, giving them even more confidence to take on mortgage debt.

When the market declined, they were upside-down on their houses, and in some cases suddenly earning far less than what they needed to cover mortgage payments.

We met one such couple in the golf resort community of La Quinta.

Blogger’s note: This is the first of a four-part series from Peter Hong and Brent Foster.

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Photo Credit: L.A. Times