It deals with what is described as the situation experienced when “the house is the only passport to a dignified old age.” A situation that, to be the same, happens in Spain, and that also most of the retirees suffer in a well-known way in our country.
In the introduction to the article, a description is made of that state of affairs, in what we once knew as the “motherland.” It is a riddle that arises, facing the situation of millions of people, whom he defines as “rich in bricks, poor in income.”
It is that of a group made up of an increasingly important number of people, which in the case of our country is not risky to assume more than a million and a half of people over 65 years of age, who have saved their entire lives by contributing to a single letter everything or almost everything; letter that is nothing more than home ownership.
Meanwhile, the amount of pensions is not always enough – we would say never better – to maintain the quality of life that they had before retirement. To which is added there and also in the case of our retirees the fact that, at older ages, greater care and expenses. The Time.news says that in the Spanish case, at least half of the retirees are those who, with the amount of their pensions, are not in a position to make ends meet; assuming, with clear suspicions that among us, that percentage is even higher, in what could be described as a chilling degree.
Attentive to the above, the problem there and here is evident. This is how it is painted, pointing out that with “bricks you cannot pay for home care, change the bathtub for a shower, cancel debts or fill the increasingly expensive shopping cart in the supermarket, even if you do not think , do not even imagine the possibility of filling it. In other words, to summarize it, there are thousands upon thousands of retirees and pensioners who need a pension supplement now and cannot have it because they have not made, nor were they surely in a position to do so, saving for retirement.
Hence, it is recommended in these cases to contemplate the possibility of obtaining in a bank -in Spain there are some that have that line of credit- a reverse mortgage. Also known as a reverse mortgage or reverse mortgage: a financial operation specially designed for seniors, and even more so for those in their fourth age.
This type of mortgage loan that bears a not distant resemblance to the life annuity institute, consists of converting the value of your home into money, without losing ownership rights. When the owner dies, it is the entity that becomes the new owner of the property, unless the heirs pay the money to the bank that gave the deceased owner in life.
It is known that way because, unlike a traditional mortgage, as explained, the debt does not decrease over time, through principal repayments and interest payments, but rather increases until a third party —the heirs of the property—they choose to assume it as their own, if they are interested in maintaining ownership of the encumbered property.
Furthermore, it should be noted that the legal regulations in force in the countries that have adopted the system, that it can be used as a mortgage loan or credit with which the homeowner makes provisions, periodically or in the form of a single payment, up to a maximum amount determined by a percentage of the appraisal value at the time of constitution, and that, when said percentage is reached, the rent is no longer available, although the debt continues to generate interest and the debtor occupies the home.
Also that, once the mortgage debtor or the last beneficiary has died, it is up to the heirs to settle the situation with the credit institution. Being able to choose to completely cancel the mortgage credit, for which they must satisfy said entity with all the overdue debits plus interest, without being able in these cases to demand any compensation for the cancellation of the mortgage.
In the event that the heirs do not want, or cannot, cancel the mortgage loan, the credit institution may execute the mortgage and thus compensate for the overdue debts, with interest, taking into account that in this case the mortgage is responsible for interest, even when it has been generated over a period of more than five years. However, the bank will only be able to obtain the recovery up to the extent of the assets of the inheritance, without the financial entity being able to execute the collection with other personal assets of the heirs.
In what is outlined, nothing that resembles a promotion of this loan system should be seen, but only point out its use in other countries. Since, to implement it in our country, as has also been highlighted, specific legislation is first needed, since it is not a conventional loan. And in this regard, another source indicates that there was a preliminary draft of the deputy Graciela Ocaña to establish it.
To which must be added how problematic it would be, at present, if it is adopted in our country in circumstances in which a runaway inflationary process is turning us, if it has not already done so, into a “country without its own currency”.
From which one could see in everything expressed here little less than a poor intellectual exercise, which not only highlights the limiting effects of inflation for so many initiatives; which at the same time constitutes a way of escaping for a moment from a distressing reality, potentiated by what can be defined as “conventillo fights”. Something that nobody ignores what we are referring to.