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Perhaps more than anywhere else on earth, here home ownership is a measure of a person’s worth, not just of material worth but of his value as a human being. No doubt this idea is hardwired to some extent in the brain of Homo sapiens; for the ability to provide is a trait valued throughout the animal kingdom. That a person owns a house is generally taken to mean that he can provide for himself and his family if he has one. In this way, a house serves not only a practical purpose, but a socio-symbolic one as well because it says, “This is the house of a person who possesses the power to acquire to such an extent that he was able to procure this dwelling.”
Of course, very few homeowners are able to purchase their homes outright in a single payment. Most people require a mortgage of some kind, over the course of which they will likely pay at least double the original cost of the home. The structure of the loan is dictated by the lender, and not the borrower, for the plain fact that the latter cannot acquire without the former, but the former can easily do without the business of the latter. If borrowers could somehow negotiate as a collective unit, rather than individually, matters would be different on this front. However, would-be homeowners must haggle with highly capitalized institutions as individuals, and therefore have little leverage with which to work.
Once a mortgage contract is entered into, it is commonly assumed that even though the borrower does not own the home outright, he is nonetheless the master of it. This assumption, however, reverses the situation. The borrower is not master of the house, but the house is master of him. If he is like most Americans, the bulk of his labors are directed toward fulfilling his contractual obligations with the lender and toward all of the necessary upkeep that accompanies the acquisition of a home. In addition to his mortgage and other home-related bills such as utilities and property taxes, he must expend a great deal of time and money to maintain the functioning and appearance of his home. When necessary, he must mow his lawn, rake leaves in fall, shovel snow in the winter, and clean the gutters. If he does not have a sewer connection (for which he pays a sewer bill) he must have his septic tank pumped from time to time. He may find it necessary to paint his house every few years or weatherize it in some other way. He may take it upon himself—or his wife may instruct him—to undertake any number of domestic projects under the guise of home improvement, when in reality the projects are merely changing the scenery in what has become a mundane household whose members lead mundane lives. Hence the constant need to rearrange furniture, to repaint walls, to remodel, to re-accessorize the house with any number of inane amenities including but not limited to houseplants, handcrafted chairs, end tables and ottomans, as well as mass-produced paintings of pastoral scenes that represent some idyllic alternate reality. And when the inhabitants of the house grow weary of the décor, a new arrangement will be hashed and the process will repeat itself.
The holding of property also produces a ball-and-chain effect which makes it far more difficult to change abodes than if one were simply renting. A renter need only wait until his lease expires before relocating. Or, he may move during his lease and suffer only a relatively minor penalty depending on the contract. But the owner of real estate who wishes, or in some cases must relocate, is burdened with not only finding a new dwelling, but with fetching a buyer for the house he wants to abandon. Depending on the change in value of the home from the time he bought it, he may lose a good deal of money on the transaction, especially if he does not own it outright.
Then there is the possibility that the homeowner must refinance, and this may be necessary for a plethora of reasons: layoff, expensive medical treatment for a sick family member, other unforeseen expenses, or some other fortuitous change in circumstance. In which case, a restructuring of the loan will act in his favor only insofar as it may allow him to pay less on a monthly basis, but more overall than what he was paying under the original mortgage. In some cases, it may be more practical in the long run to move than refinance, but that prospect is often a daunting one psychologically.
All of this is exacerbated by the presence of a spouse or children. It is one thing for a person to decide for himself to up and leave, but the family man or woman must take into consideration the feelings of others and determine whether uprooting the family would be worth the inconvenience and instability that often accompanies such transitions.
Even with real estate prices down, the trend of stagnant wages and rising costs associated with basic living (food, health insurance, college) is enough to make home ownership for future generations an exercise in neofeudal bondage. The banks will own the homes and land, and the inhabitants will till and toil for decades in the hopes of someday owning the property outright. It is not to be doubted that millions of Americans desire a house with a lush green lawn, but it would be wise to ask whether this is a natural ambition, or one that is manufactured by certain social institutions. As an instrument for maintaining the status quo favored by the Establishment, the idea of property is an invaluable tool. It convinces the rabble that they might have a stake in the country, but in order to acquire it they must assume substantial debt. The burden of debt and the fear of not being able to pay it, is more than enough to keep many Americans docile, lest they become unemployed and unable to achieve what is colloquially called the American Dream.
- Max
max.canning@gmail.com
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