Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

lady kills self to pay off mortgage

K

Keebler

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Jun 20, 2005
2,966
253
Canada
this is sad.

i could be wrong, but this might be even worse if i'm right - don't most life insurance companies have a disclaimer saying that they won't pay for suicides? Or else more ppl in dire situations would do the same thing?

ugh. i feel for the husband and brother. it also makes me appreciate my relationship with my wife b/c we're open about everything. no situation would get that dire. so sad :(

Woman kills self before home foreclosure
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS




TAUNTON, Mass. - A 53-year-old wife and mother fatally shot herself shortly after faxing a letter to her mortgage company saying that by the time they foreclosed on her house that day, she would be dead.

Police said that Carlene Balderrama used her husband's high-powered rifle to kill herself Tuesday afternoon, shortly after faxing the letter at 2:30 p.m.

The mortgage company called police, who found Balderrama's body at 3:30 p.m. The auction was scheduled to start at 5 p.m. and interested buyers arrived at the property in Taunton, about 55 kilometres south of Boston, while Balderrama's body was still inside, according to Taunton police chief Raymond O'Berg.

Police did not immediately release the name of the mortgage company. O'Berg said Balderrama's fax read, in part, "By the time you foreclose on my house I'll be dead."

O'Berg also said a suicide note found next to Balderrama told her husband, John, and 24-year-old son to "take the (life) insurance money and pay for the house."

Joe Whitney, who works with Balderrama's husband, a plumber, said that Balderrama handled the bills and her husband didn't know about the foreclosure.

"John didn't even know about it, that's the surprise," Whitney said told The Boston Globe. "It's just one of those awful, awful tragic events."
 
:( Very sad. How desperate and alone she must have felt. And how will her husband and son feel, even if they can use the money to pay off the house?

Some policies have suicide clauses, but not all. I really hope she researched her policy.
 
This was on the local news last night, so depressing. It is just so sad that the banks are forcing people into situations where they would even contemplate suicide, yet alone commit it. Suicide is a harsh thing that affects many, and is so confusing to understand. Most people don't even realize how much they mean to others until it is too late, I had a good friend who took his life at the end of school last year, I don't think he realized how much he meant to people, but all of the people that came together afterwards showed how much he mattered to everyone. My prayers are with her family and all of those afflicted by suicide.
 
Abstract said:
^^^I was wondering the same thing regarding the suicide and insurance claims. I didn't know you could insure for suicide.
Click to expand...
A surprising number of policies will pay out for suicides, but many have a rider that makes it so that the policy has to have been in place for a certain time period before it would be in effect. IOW, you couldn't get a policy, pay the first premium, and then kill yourself, but if you've been insured for a while (at least two years, sometimes longer), they will pay on a suicide claim.
 
Most policies have a waiting period of a year or so. I can only imagine what losing your home would feel like, and what is worse is that they family didn't seem to communicate if they just found out about the foreclosure. Sounds like deeper issues going on. :(
 
iShater said:
...I can only imagine what losing your home would feel like, and what is worse is that they family didn't seem to communicate if they just found out about the foreclosure. Sounds like deeper issues going on. :(
Click to expand...
That is what is so sad about it, the way that the local news made it out to be last night was that the husband had no idea whatsoever about the foreclosure. How she could hide something like that from him astounds me. I just hope that her suicide doesn't put her family in any worse of a situation.
 
This is very sad... I can't imagine how difficult the circumstances must have been, the combination of financial stress and hiding it from your family while feeling responsible. Amazingly difficult for them all.
 
iShater said:
Most policies have a waiting period of a year or so. I can only imagine what losing your home would feel like, and what is worse is that they family didn't seem to communicate if they just found out about the foreclosure. Sounds like deeper issues going on. :(
Click to expand...
Sad.

Looks like she handled the finances and may have been afraid to tell her family, hence her choice of suicide as an out.

Many policies pay up on suicides provided that they have been in effect for a certain period of time.

Agree with you that there may be deeper issues. There usually is. The media is not what it used to be years ago when you got most of the story. Today, we get tidbits over time.
 
JML42691 said:
This was on the local news last night, so depressing. It is just so sad that the banks are forcing people into situations where they would even contemplate suicide, yet alone commit it. Suicide is a harsh thing that affects many, and is so confusing to understand. Most people don't even realize how much they mean to others until it is too late, I had a good friend who took his life at the end of school last year, I don't think he realized how much he meant to people, but all of the people that came together afterwards showed how much he mattered to everyone. My prayers are with her family and all of those afflicted by suicide.
Click to expand...

i agree, but i think it's part the bank's fault and the home owners. alot of ppl are in way over their heads and they knew it going in. unfortunately, we're at the mercy of the markets so jobs change, vanish and prices of everything are going up. some of the banks definitely had sneaky clauses. My wife is a financial planner and has seen enough of both cases (ppl over their head and banks taking advantage of folks).

still sad nonetheless.
 
Unfortunately, don't think she's the first and won't be the last. A whole bunch of folks got in over their heads and now is not an easy time to regroup.

Poor husband didn't know house was being foreclosed on and has a dead wife - now that sucks and like previously posted, suicide isn't usually covered under standard life insurance policies. Funerals cost a pretty penny, too.
 
NC MacGuy said:
Unfortunately, don't think she's the first and won't be the last. A whole bunch of folks got in over their heads and now is not an easy time to regroup.

Poor husband didn't know house was being foreclosed on and has a dead wife - now that sucks and like previously posted, suicide isn't usually covered under standard life insurance policies. Funerals cost a pretty penny, too.
Click to expand...

The funeral would be pretty akward too.
 
That is sad.

The whole situation reminds me of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, where one parent makes the ultimate sacrifice to ensure their family's financial security. I only hope that her husband and son can eventually understand and forgive her.

Also unfortunate that it took the insurance company and police department an hour to respond. I doubt it would have made a difference, but you never know.
 
EricNau said:
That is sad.

The whole situation reminds me of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, where one parent makes the ultimate sacrifice to ensure their family's financial security. I only hope that her husband and son can eventually understand and forgive her.

Also unfortunate that it took the insurance company and police department an hour to respond. I doubt it would have made a difference, but you never know.
Click to expand...

My guess was the delay was the fax working it's way through the Mortgage company layers before it found someone with the authority to authorize the call. Also, the MC is probably 2 states away and would have to dig up the info to call the police.

Feel sorry that she saw no other way out, but it comes back to the lenders, the subprime mess, and people in over their heads. Why didn't she just declare bankruptcy? Doesn't that protect your house until a judge figures out who is responsible for what?
 
I'm sure her husband and son would much rather have moved with her to rented accommodation until the family finances recovered, which they would eventually have done. Other places can become home, but you lose a family member forever.
 
This is terrible and really speaks for the current crises that we are in. People are losing their homes. My family lost the home that I grew up in when my father lost his high paying tech job in December 2005. We have made ends since then and my dad is now a director of IT for a school district but still isn't making the kind of money he made before. Makes me fearful to do a 30- year mortgage if I ever do buy a house (but that is a different story).

I would be afraid that even if the insurance company did pay for suicide, they might not pay for this because she wrote to her husband to use the money to pay for the house, so they might claim that she committed suicide so her husband could get the money. Sad the way insurance companies do things for profits.
 
I feel bad for her, however here is the reality. First, she is in a state where they are VERY "borrower-friendly." The Massachusetts Attorney General has and will continue to take action against EVERY lender and will file for foreclosure protection while stopping at nothing.

Google it if you're unclear about that.
Now, in my past I was in a unique position to receive threats of this nature. Many were never true. In a 12-month period three turned out to be very true. One woman said "you'll take my house over my dead body" and there it was. She burned her house down...she was in it. Another man said on the phone he would shoot himself, he did. The third one just took care of himself and left me out of it.

The fact is losing the home that you worked for is devastating. There are people who actually worked for their loans. This excludes the general population of douche bags who used the equity in their homes as an ATM. Sorry guys but whine all you want, this is how it rolled. Lenders didn't give a crap and neither did you!

I feel badly for this lady though, it appears she was in the minority who just wanted to keep her home after working for it. Maybe she wasn't, we'll never know.

Bottom line, we were all in this together. Lenders/Borrowers/Investors.
 
I had a friend tell me today how their father tried to kill himself over debts(and no doubt other stuff) just yesterday. He stabbed himself several times and slashed at his throat, he was found before bleeding out and is now recovering.

There're an awful lot of people out there under an awful lot of stress and pressure right now.:(
 
I forget what the movie is called, but there is a documentary that focuses on this issue, the corruption of banks, and American economics.

It was quite telling. Very sad and this reminded me of it.
 
There is something really, really shady about this whole thing.

This woman didn't pay her mortgage bill for 42 months, according to a full news article, and her husband didn't know? He didn't know that she didn't make payments for almost 4 years??

Also, he had filed for bankruptcy 3 times since like 2001 or something.

The house was scheduled for auction like that afternoon at 5 p.m. and people were on their way over to look at the house. If the bank was that far along in the foreclosure process, that family was not going to keep the house even if they had the money that day.
 
As sad as this is, some of the blame should be on the woman and her husband. I don't know what their life is like but one this is for sure, they bought something they couldn't afford.
 
ErikCLDR said:
As sad as this is, some of the blame should be on the woman and her husband. I don't know what their life is like but one this is for sure, they bought something they couldn't afford.
Click to expand...

The bank that made them a loan they couldn't afford isn't without blame either. Nor could be a real estate agent who tries to push people into the absolute max they can get a loan for to bolster their commission.

I'm on my seventh house purchase and noticed since the first one bought in 1985 to the last one in 2003, the rules got very lax. Fortunately I stuck to my guns and bought at 70% of payment they said I qualified for.

This is a crisis that's reached epidemic and it's banks, realtors and over reaching buyers who all share the blame.
 
mac-er said:
There is something really, really shady about this whole thing.

This woman didn't pay her mortgage bill for 42 months, according to a full news article, and her husband didn't know? He didn't know that she didn't make payments for almost 4 years??

Also, he had filed for bankruptcy 3 times since like 2001 or something.

The house was scheduled for auction like that afternoon at 5 p.m. and people were on their way over to look at the house. If the bank was that far along in the foreclosure process, that family was not going to keep the house even if they had the money that day.
Click to expand...

Maybe that's why she committed suicide? Her husband didn't know, but she knew that he would definitely know when people come to the auction, and rather than confronting him, she offs herself?
 
What's even worse, was that the auction was held while her body was still in the house.

The article I read didn't say whether the auction was cancelled or not, only that the auctioneer's had already started to arrive.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back