“You Can’t Pass it On if it Belongs to Someone Else”

Near Columbia College, just on the outskirts of downtown in SouthCarolina’s capital, sits a brick house with “flowers galore” whose azaleas are fresh in Mildred Watson’s mind.

The three-bedroom house with white columns marking its entrance belonged to Watson’s mother and late stepfather. Watson, 74, wanted to keep it in the family and sought to pass the home on to her children.

“But you can’t pass it on if it belongs to somebody else,” Watson says. “The way things went, we had to get out of there and forget it.”

Watson says her mother, now in her early 90s and residing in a nursing home, lost her home through a series of refinancings that stripped the equity from the property.

The saga moved Watson to share her experiences with others so they could avoid a similar fate. She spoke up for others, who often prefer to suffer in silence.

Earlier this year, she testified before a South Carolina House subcommittee as it deliberated legislation designed to protect consumers from unfair lending practices—called predatory lending—that threaten the loss of homes and automobiles.

“Don’t just go borrowing money,” Watson says. “Know the ins and outs of it.” Otherwise, she added, the creditors will have it. “Then, no house.”

Sue Berkowitz, director of the South Carolina Appleseed Legal Justice Center, an organization that advocates for low-income residents, says too many in the Palmetto State are losing their homes to schemes that promise easy money or credit.

“It’s literally siphoning wealth from the people who can least afford it,” Berkowitz says. “They’ve worked very hard for the American Dream of having that home and suddenly it’s being taken away from them.”

Here, the state House of Representatives and Senate have adopted different versions of legislation to curb predatory lending. Now, a joint House-Senate panel will attempt to broker a compromise measure that will be endorsed by the General Assembly.

If lawmakers reach an agreement, Berkowitz says Watson deserves some accolades.

“I give her so much credit for having the strength to get up there and testify,” Berkowitz says. “(Many people) don’t want to let their friends and neighbors know what happened to them or what happened to their parents.”

But Watson, a retired elementary school teacher, says she just drew on lessons learned in the classroom when she testified before lawmakers.

“If you don’t talk much, you don’t teach much,” Watson says. “You have to keep on talking.”