Is anyone else nervous about their career/future?

As some of you know i currently (not for long) work in the mortgage industry. Because of the mortgage crisis I do not plan on having this job for much longer.
Considering that our company (along with every other) is not making any money at all, I will either be laid off or quit.

So many people got laid off in this industry which has been so lucrative for so many years. I suspect possibly hundreds of thousands will lose their jobs or be forced to leave within the next couple of years.

All these people are going to be looking for new jobs, who knows where.

I keep reading that our (Americas) economy is about to collapse. I am very concerned, i honestly do not know what i am going to do. Who will hire me if there are so many people in the same position as i am?

Are any of you concerned about your occupation being effected in the near future by the housing/mortgage crisis and the concern of a crash?!?

There may be short term cause for alarm and so it might be wise to have a backup plan in place. You have a better feel for the situation, probably better than anyone.

I think that in the long term, however, things will return to normal.

Can you expand a little on what you have said, so that those of us who are not in that industry might have a better understanding of the mechanics of this crisis?

Originally posted by GradyPhilpott


Can you expand a little on what you have said, so that those of us who are not in that industry might have a better understanding of the mechanics of this crisis?

Well basically all across the nation houses are starting to lose value instead of gaining value. I suspect this isn't the case in some booming states such as texas and arizona. But in California, New York, Florida and many states with large populations the houses went up so much in such a short period of time.

ughhh there's so much to it, i really don't even know where to start. But, anyway the problem is people can't afford their mortgages anymore, and people have mortgages on their properties that are higher then the value of their house!
Right now banks allover the nation are closing because they gave loans to people who cant afford to pay them.

So many people in the industy lost their jobs or are going to lose their jobs and so many people are going to be forced to leave their homes. Now, the real-estate market is so bad, no one is buying any properties!

There is too much to it, but check out the threads about the subprime mortgage crisis and you will understand it more clearly.

With all the financial markets seemingly linked to one another, and the largest financial marketplace bouncing up and down, I think we all have cause for concern.

If the markets are not stable this makes businesses think about investing which has a ripple effect. And with the US being such a business headquarter rich country, changes to investment plans are felt around the world.

Having been laid off twice in the last 18 months and I am not in the mortgage/finance business, it takes very little for businesses to react.

However, I see the recent blip as just that, a blip and think that the world economy is sound but will always react to any ripples, particularly from the world's largest economy.

And hikix, if things happen, just hang in there. In both cases, I had new jobs 6 months and 2 months.

I think it's unfortunate that lenders thought it was a good idea to give these loans to home buyers who weren't financially prepared to pay. I also think it's unfortunate that those home buyers didn't have the foresight to realize that it wasn't a secure investment. They are the two culprits who got us into this mess.

I was recently hiring for an ECommerce Account Specialist position in my company. I received about 150 resume's over a three month period, and i'll bet half of them were real estate agents or people who previously worked in the mortgage industry. I ended up offering the position to someone who had experience in the ECommerce feld.

I don't know how you're going to fare out there on the job market if/when you are sent packing. I would suggest doing what you can right now to get some additional education or experience in a field where your current abilities can be applied, and start testing the waters. You don't want to be in the middle of that pack of people who are looking for work, you want to be at the front of it.

However, there will always be a market for your field. My wife and I declined not to purchase a house in the last few years. We live in Florida, and it's just not enough versus what you're paying for here, it's not smart to buy a house right now. We are in the process of building our credit and saving money for a house. I HOPE we will be in a good position to buy in the next year, and I HOPE this current scare won't influence our outcome adversely.

I work in Internet Marketing so i'm not concerned about the future of my career. It is a new field in a new medium, and it can go in any number of different directions. If you know anything about the internet, i would suggest at least starting an information website based on home buying or something like that. It might look good on a resume if you're seeking employment in an internet-related field, and it might even make you a little money.

Originally posted by hikix
Well basically all across the nation houses are starting to lose value instead of gaining value. I suspect this isn't the case in some booming states such as texas and arizona. But in California, New York, Florida and many states with large populations the houses went up so much in such a short period of time.

The real estate market is for # all across the nation except for Miami and Denver.

It's those ARM mortgages that are screwing things up...

Oh, and the paychecks that can't pay the bills. That's not helping either.


As far as a job that will never go out of fashion, get involved in selling rich people things they don't need but can't live without. It's one of the few booming markets right now...

Things aren't looking very good.

As I've said before, I don't know a damn thing about money, but I have been hearing about the "housing bubble" for several years now and like a lot of things, there were believers and non-believers.

The more time passed the more it seemed like the believers were like the little boy who cried "wolf."

I guess it pays to the prophets of doom.

abcnews.go.com...

www.usatoday.com...

www.washingtonpost.com...

[edit on 2007/8/28 by GradyPhilpott]

Everything is linked to another, and this mortgage/real-estate crisis is screwing up ALOT of things!

My friend just took over his dads plumbing business, i think im going to go in with him on that. I don't know too much about plumbing.. but heat and water will never go out of fashion!

This doesn't bode well for the lending industry.

Struggling lender Countrywide Financial Corp. will cut as many as 12,000 jobs as it struggles to deal with challenging conditions in the mortgage industry, the company said Friday.

The cuts, amounting to as much as 20 percent of its work force, are needed because the company expects new mortgages to fall about 25 percent in 2008 from this year’s levels, Countrywide said.

www.msnbc.msn.com...