So you just graduated from that pricey and prestigious liberal arts college and you and your sweetie owe an astronomical conglomeration of more than $125,000 in student loans. Neither of you have job prospects yet, but they're coming, baby, they're coming; and you and your significant other want to buy a home.
Never fear, The BurkeyLoan is here. You can buy that $350,000 McMansion in the 'burbs and roll all that student loan debt right into your 30-year fixed mortgage.
WHAT A DEAL!!!
But there are a few caveats. According to Yahoo! News: "Borrowers will be expected to chip in a 10% down payment when both the price of the home and the outstanding student debt have been added up. "We want them to have skin in the game," says John Burkey, the CEO of both BurkeyLoan and its apparent parent company, Burkey Capital.
"Translation: If a borrower with $100,000 in student loans wants to buy a $500,000 home, they'd be on the hook for 10% of $600,000. That comes out to a $60,000 down payment. But in some cases, buyers could put in less, he says, Yahoo! News continues.
In addition, if a major life event occurs, such as someone falling ill or experiencing a death in the immediate family, their payments can be deferred for a time, Yahoo! News says. So if this writer may editorialize a bit, Gertie, right after you get that loan, fake sick - a major illness like leukemia or lung cancer - this will give you and your beau some time to come up with some much-needed cash. And get that down payment from your parents and grandparents. Tell them, "YOU SLOBS GOT TO GO TO COLLEGE FOR FREE! ME AND MY MAN HAVE A GODZILLA & MEGALON OF STUDENT LOAN DEBT AND WE'VE GOT TO LIVE SOMEWHERE, RIGHT?! AND WE'RE LIVING IN A McMANSION, COME HELL OR HIGH WATER!!!" - That's it, girl, just put your parents and grandparents on guilt trips. Ditto for Alex's family, too. They'll surely hand you all that cash with smiles on their physiognomies.
A HOUSE AND NOT A HOME: You and your beau, Alex, just love the house. It's got funky windows that stick out every which way, it's got pillars in front of the porch, and most of all, it's HUGE! You and your guy are both in excellent shape, are very fit, and you both can roam around all that massive square footage like two zoo apes in their spacious enclosure.
You and Alex have no money for furniture, fancy light fixtures, or a car to park in that big three-car garage; but remember, you're both in good shape, so fit you can both scale the Matterhorn.
You can deal with it, baby. You like candles, right? Especially the scented kinds that smell like spring days, flowers and waterfalls. Am I right or am I wrong? Bingo! So look at it this way: You don't need electricity. Let those waxed sticks burn, baby! And who needs that sprawling leather divan? Do you really need those comfy recliners? Or a living room table with chairs or even a little dinette set?
BECOME HIPPIES: No. You don't need these "peripherals". Sit cross-legged on the floor like two hippies right out of Haight-Asbury in the early 60's. You don't have any clothes because you both had to sell your entire wardrobes for that little necessity called "food". So furniture just isn't an option right now. But make it fun! Play all those old Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane songs from those cassettes you stole from your grandparents. And play them on that dusty old cassette recorder you stole out of your granddaddy's attic. Your grandparents, by the way, went to the state university free on things like Pell Grants and other kinds of government free-bees, which just don't exist anymore.
It's not all that bad, Gertie. You and Alex are young, after all! Play that music full blast and screw on the floor like feisty rodents, just like the "flower children" of the 60's used to do! Sitting around in your underwear on that McMansion's hard floor will get you both horny, no doubt....And you and Alex are both very good-looking now, so carpe diem, girly! Seize the fucking day! When you get old, fat, and gray, it just won't be the same - sex, that is - you'll both implode into crevices, craters, and over time, you'll become sickly and spindly-limbed kangaroo-looking creatures. But by then, Gertie, you and Alex will have an excellent credit rating, plenty of possessions, possibly even homes (in the plural sense), and you'll most likely be able to pay cash for that dude ranch that sits over the sea.
Details about the loan are a bit skimpy right now, and just why this "revolutionary" new home/student loan plan is so "revolutionary" are nebulous, at best, but hey baby, there's help out there if you and Alex need it! But you'll most likely have to take a back seat to the newly graduated doctors and lawyers for a while, destined to be the "revolutionary" first grabbers of this shipwreck of financial wizardry.
RIDE BIKES TO WORK, IT'S GOOD "CARDIO:: Make sure you have some petty cash left over before you move into your McMansion, to buy matching, love-dove, 10-speed bikes for you and Alex to ride to work on when you get that big job at the stockbroker's downtown. With a mad mix of student loan and mortgage debt capping out at way over a half-million, you and Alex will never be able to spring for two matching onyx BMWs. You most likely won't be able to afford brand new 10-speeds, so shop around for your bikes at yard sales, pawn shops, garage sales, discount stores, big lots extravaganzas and the like. Scan the classifieds regularly - there are always bikes for sale there, especially in February, after all those New Year's Resolutions get nixed. Any bike between twenty and thirty bucks is surely in you and Alex's price range. Pedal, baby, pedal!
It's a shame that the city bus doesn't travel to the 'burbs, or you could take that rusty old dinosaur to work. The bus route sort of left out the suburban sprawl of the environs holding your McMansion. The bus is a drag, though, since for most destinations, a transfer to the downtown bus station is necessary before the bus that transports you to the financial district runs. And that magic bus only runs every hour on weekdays and if you have to work weekends, it runs once every two hours. If you're fortunate enough to have a bus route going nearby your McMansion, leave yourself at least two hours to get to work, and another two hours to get back home.
SIGN CORRECTLY ON THAT OMINOUS, INTIMIDATING DOTTED LINE: And Gertie, dear, make sure you sign your full christened name on the dotted line of all those The BurkeyLoan documents. And that name, if you remember correctly, is Gertrude Bernice Yellowmore. Got it? Don't try to weasel your way out of those national-debt-like loan payments by signing "Mary Lynn Monroe" or "Cheltzee L. Handwarmer" or "Mary Hadalittlelamb".
According to Yahoo! News: "The BurkeyLoan, developed by financial company Burkey Capital, is expected to hit the market this fall with a seductive and unique sales pitch: to help college grads become homeowners by rolling their student debt into a 30-year fixed mortgage."
HERE'S THE SCUTTLEBUTT: "So here's how it's supposed to work. The target borrower will be the crème de la crème of college grads (think doctors or lawyers instead of store managers). They'll be in the top 20% or so of earning households, have stellar credit, and have at least three to four years of work experience where they raked in at least $150,000 a year, according to the company," So here's how it's supposed to work. The target borrower will be the crème de la crème of college grads (think doctors or lawyers instead of store managers). They'll be in the top 20% or so of earning households, have stellar credit, and have at least three to four years of work experience where they raked in at least $150,000 a year, according to the company. They'll also need to work in fields, such as medicine, where if they lost their jobs, they could easily find another. So already this excludes most cash-strapped college grads. Initially, the program will be offered only for jumbo loans, which start at $417,000. But that is expected to eventually drop to help facilitate the purchase of properties in the mid-$200,000s, says John Burkey, the CEO of both BurkeyLoan and Burkey Capital.
"They'll also need to work in fields, such as medicine, where if they lost their jobs, they could easily find another. So already this excludes most cash-strapped college grads," Yahoo! News reports. But if this writer may editorialize a bit, if this loan package isn't such a big hit, Political Science majors, as well as Economics, Philosophy, Fire Science, and even those getting bachelor degrees in Astronomy and Animal Husbandry may be targets for The BurkeyLoan in good time.
"Initially, the program will be offered only for jumbo loans, which start at $417,000. But that is expected to eventually drop to help facilitate the purchase of properties in the mid-$200,000s, says John Burkey, the CEO of both BurkeyLoan and Burkey Capital," according to Yahoo! News.
TRY HUMBLE BEGINNINGS UNTIL YOU HIT THE JACKPOT: So Gertie and Alex, rent that one-bedroom, HUD-assisted apartment way out there in the suburban outback for now. For snacks and room decorations, you can always walk a few hundred yards to the dollar stores in front of that tenement complex. And just bide your time. Your BA, Gertie, in English Literature and Alex's bachelor's in Sociology might be as good as gold if there aren't a lot of takers for The BurkeyLoan's "revolutionary" new plan. And hey, when you secure that loan and are way over your head in debt, you and your neighboring McMansion allies in that gated community can start a revolution of your own.
