[firesteelrain]

That period of time was very rough. We bought our first home in 2006 for $134k and by 2007 it was worth about $59k. Even after adding on to it by converting our porch to another room, we ran out of room fast with the birth of our second child. I had one bedroom for one child who was about 5 or 6 and the second shared it with us. Since we couldn’t sell it with that much difference - we simply didn’t have the money to make up that difference - we ended up conducting a short sale in 2012. I rented until 2014 then used the VA Home Loan to buy my home which I have lived in for the past 10 years. It took 7 years to clear my credit report. But VA was very forgiving and the banks were OK to provide a mortgage at that time with VA backing. So it was less of a risk.