Voices: starting over: foreclosure on their home turned life upside down for Amber Vickerman and her family.

• Author: Vickerman, Amber
• Position: Essay

We had lived on the east side of St. Paul, Minnesota, my whole life. My parents bought a home there 21 years ago, and I didn't think I would have to move until I got my own apartment. But foreclosure on our home last year changed all that.

About five years ago, my parents needed to buy a new car so they could drive my grandmother to cancer treatments at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, 80 miles away. So they refinanced our home with an adjustable rate mortgage, which allows the tender to adjust the interest rate up or down. They thought this type of mortgage would be easier and quicker to pay off.

At first, the payments were reasonable. But before long, they went up a hundred dollars or so, and then another hundred. Soon my mom, an administrative assistant in an office, was paying $1,600 a month. My dad was unable to work due to an injury.

In October 2007, my parents received a notice from the bank that the interest rate was jumping up by 4.25 percent. There was no way we could make that kind of payment and still have food on the table and clothes on our backs. Our house would have to go back to the bank. We had one year from the date of the foreclosure notice until we had to be completely off the property.

This had a huge impact on all our lives. We had to change our whole lifestyle and downsize on everything. We could only keep some of our furnishings. This made us rethink what is most important to us. I knew I would have to take along my teddy bear, Olive, and my blue blanket from when I was a Little kid. But we Left a tot of our most cherished memories behind.

A NEW HOME

It was a little scary when we finally moved in May: It felt Like we were having to start our Lives over again. The old neighborhood was where...