Foreclosure guilt haunts home buyers

LAS VEGAS -- Right about now, Anya Sanko should be enjoying the thrill of being a first-time home buyer. She bided her time, saved her money and jumped into the market in time to snap up a 1,785-square-foot home with a pool for $143,000.

Yet Sanko, 37, is having a hard time celebrating. Her parents lost their house in Michigan to foreclosure after her father lost his job, her sister's home equity has evaporated and friends struggling with mortgages don't want to hear it.

And then there's that slab in the backyard of the foreclosed house she bought. The previous owners and their children had scrawled their names in it when the concrete was poured, back in 2005 when they bought it for $287,500 amid the Vegas housing boom.

"I think about them all the time," says Sanko, who works for the city of Las Vegas. "I see the names in that concrete slab, sometimes I get their mail, I see all the work they put into this house.

"It's sad that they never got the reward from all of that work."

Living with the past

This sentiment — call it economic survivor guilt — is a little-noticed emotional byproduct of the financial devastation wrought by the housing and banking meltdowns of the past year. Sanko was always frugal, has a stable job and bought within her means, and yet there's a lingering sense, as she puts it, that "you're capitalizing off of somebody else's misfortune."

It's an especially prevalent feeling here in Las Vegas and surrounding Clark County, which RealtyTrac found in mid-July had the nation's highest foreclosure rate. One in 13 homes was owned by banks, the research firm found, a startling statistic that reflects both the extent of the region's economic turmoil and the abundance of houses for sale at bargain-basement prices.

"I do hear this from people who are looking, that it feels strange to be getting a great deal because someone else couldn't afford their home," says Jack LeVine, a local real estate agent. "I just remind them that it's not their fault and that they need to take advantage of the market for the good of their families."