[dragonwriter]

> At the trade-off of never being able to get a mortgage again

That's not the effect of abandoning a mortgage (or using the leverage provided by that option to secure lender approval for a short sale) in a non-recourse state.

(Source: been there, done that, have a new mortgage since.)

[bombcar]

The costs and hassle of moving kept me in an underwater house that I mathematically should have walked on; eventually it wasn’t underwater and the mortgage was paid the entire time because I couldn’t be arsed to move.

The potential credit hit wasn’t even a consideration.