The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette recently published a story about a growing crisis involving American families who are having a difficult time keeping up with house payments. The following are some excerpts from the article. For obvious reasons, we like the ending.

One of the primary causes of the housing bust was that homes cost too much to begin with, […] forcing Americans to take desperate measures to obtain financing.

Now they are struggling to keep those homes, which often requires two incomes and the loss of family and community life due to being constantly on the road while their children are spending 10 to 12 hours a day in day care. With unemployment rising and commuting costs up, many families can’t make it work anymore.

Whereas the American dream became an obsession with ever-bigger homes, [John] Wasik, author of a recently released book that examines the housing crisis, “The Cul-De-Sac Syndrome: Turning Around the Unsustainable American Dream.” said that in the future, people need to think of ways to build homes and cities that are more suitable for the global environment.

“Homes shouldn’t be energy hogs in the future,” he said. “We can go to modular homes built in factories. Think of all the people we could put back to work and make homes more affordable.”

We might be a bit biased, but we couldn’t agree more!