When you have a large sense of entitlement & enough credit to ruin yourself, this is what you get.  About two years ago I read an article in the Times, by another financial writer, who had pretty much done what this guy did - he mortgaged his newly purchased & quite unaffordable 3 bedroom colonial located in lah-di-dah ville,  to the max - so that he & his new wife & family could be "happy".  As a boomer, I grew up in a 3 bedroom colonial in a leafy but boring suburb west of Boston.  My parents grew up in 3 deckers in Worcester.  My father was the only one in his very large, immigrant family to ever go to college.  Sad, but true, it never once occurred to me, growing up, that I would ever live in anything smaller than a 3 bedroom colonial in a leafy, boring suburb.  My parents were perpetually amazed at their good fortune in living where we did - I, & many of my friends, just took it for granted.   The financial writer sounded a lot like a boomer - buy it on credit because it's a given that you somehow need & deserve to have that kind of lifestyle & then put the rest of your living expenses on your credit card.  Lemmings.