She was nice as could be. As I handed over my paycheck and a deposit slip, the bank teller smiled and asked, "Are you a homeowner?"
The correct answer would be that I'm getting there. I shortened it to "I am."
Next came the question of whether I have a home equity line of credit. Nope, no ready access to the chunk of my home's value that I actually do own.
All smiles, she said the bank was offering a good deal to homeowners like me. I don't need that equity money now, I said. Her pitch persisted with a suggestion that I should "open one now, before you need it."
These days, enticements to borrow are as close as a credit card offer in your mailbox. Is anyone putting the brakes on folks who would borrow too freely? From what I see, it's up to us to put the brakes on ourselves.
In Congress on Tuesday, the House Committee on Financial Services heard cautionary words from Sheila Bair, chairwoman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Bair told lawmakers that curbs are needed on so-called subprime mortgages, in which people with questionable credit are wooed by affordable rates. Typically, payments later rise beyond borrowers' ability to pay.
Sure, I know that a home equity line of credit offered by my bank - which happens to be Bank of America, the country's largest consumer bank - is a far cry from a risky subprime loan.
Still, it makes me nervous to think I could potentially take thousands of dollars in equity from my house, spend it on a cool new kitchen or a trip around the world, and be left with years of payments.
It should make me nervous. At 53, I'm just a decade from at least considering retirement. How much debt do I want the day I stop working?
"It's certainly true that customers need to be responsible for their own finances and credit," said Peggy Lawlor, senior vice president of for Bank of America. "A home equity line of credit is not for everyone."
Speaking from Rhode Island, Lawlor said Thursday the bank looks carefully not just at equity, but at income. Not every homeowner qualifies. "We'll approve about 70 percent of the home equity applications we're taking this year," she said.
Among Bank of America customers, she said, most take out a home equity line of credit for home improvements. "The number two use is debt consolidation," Lawlor said.
Paying off credit cards with lower-interest loans can be prudent, but only if borrowers mend their freewheeling ways. That's the counsel from Alec Williamson, a certified financial planner with StanCorp Investment Advisers in Lynnwood.
"If you can lower your interest significantly, and have the discipline, it works," Williamson said. "What is your pattern? The scary thing that happens with alarming frequency is, you get out of high interest credit card debt. A year later, you've got the home equity line and new credit card balances."
Williamson cautions against using your home for what he calls short-term assets, like cars. "It's a snowball, it just keeps rolling,".
Thinking of fiscal snowballs I'd like to avoid, I can't help but remember my dear Uncle Fred, my father's older brother.
Born in 1913, Frederick Ahrens got a job during the Depression as a messenger for the Spokane and Eastern Branch of Seattle-First National Bank. The bank became Seafirst in the 1970s, and then Bank of America in the 1990s.
"He was a vice president at the bank," my father said of his late brother on Thursday. "He did mortgages." That is, he did mortgages until he retired to play golf and spend summers fishing at Idaho's Lake Coeur d'Alene. I was just a kid when my uncle retired. And he was only 50.
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