MRC123~
I suggest staying in this forum and going through the threads...there are quite a few from others regarding walking away in AZ. Myself included...My husband and I made the decision to walk away less than a month ago and are going to be renting an apartment. We have a 17 month old and I am 9 months prego. We loved having a house and it being our own, but eventually it came down to it being a business decision and we decided to swallow our pride and say you know what...we can move on and we will
With regards to your questions 1 and 2, it really depends on a lot of things. Are you going to continue to pay the rest of your bills and just let the home go? Or are you wanting to not pay anything? Obvioulsy not paying anything will affect your credit even more than just not paying the mortgage. Also, depending on how long foreclosure takes is how many late payments you'll have showing on your credit along with the foreclosure, which could affect it more. With regards to question 3, since we are in AZ we are a non-recourse, anti-deficiency state. Basically, as long as your loan was a "purchase money mortgage" was not a home equity loan or a HELOC your loan qualifies under non-recourse. As for anti-deficiency, no matter what, even without the new law passed, we still are not liable for the difference, nor do we have to report it as I called the Maricopa State Bar and met with a lawyer for 30 min and $35 to find out if my loan qualified and make sure we were covered.