When Doing the Right Thing Costs $25 Million

“We don’t have a housing shortage — we have a broken housing system that’s forgotten how to take care of its own.”

When I wired $25 million back to the U.S. taxpayers during a government shutdown, it wasn’t a publicity move or a headline stunt.

It was the result of doing business the right way — even when the system itself doesn’t make it easy to do so.

That single transaction reminded me how broken the infrastructure around housing finance has become and how urgently it needs reform.

Most people don’t realize that the government holds a massive portfolio of non-performing reverse mortgages — loans that were meant to help seniors access their home equity for living expenses.

When those loans default, there’s no clear or efficient mechanism at HUD to handle them. The result? Thousands of vacant homes sitting in limbo, communities quietly deteriorating, and taxpayers footing the bill for inertia.

We keep hearing there’s a “housing shortage,” but what if the problem isn’t a lack of homes — it’s that the homes we already have aren’t moving through the system?

Today, our housing inventory per capita mirrors 2008 levels.

Yet tens of thousands of properties remain idle because they’re trapped in bureaucratic purgatory or locked behind non-performing debt.

At First Lien Capital, my team and I spend our days tackling this problem head-on — acquiring and rehabilitating distressed loans, returning these homes to productive use, and restoring both value and dignity to the process.

It’s the kind of work that creates real impact — not just returns.

The truth is, our housing market doesn’t need more speculation; it needs more stewardship. And the investors who understand that — who bring integrity, creativity, and compassion into the equation — are the ones shaping the future of American real estate.

You can hear the full story about why I wired the US taxpayers $25 million in this episode of Debt Doctor.

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Catch you in the next episode,

 – Bill Bymel, Debt Doctor

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First Lien Capital is your trusted investment partner delivering security and strong returns while making real impact, and First Lien Resolutions is your Special Assets Group for hire delivering integrated resolutions to protect capital and restore performance to distressed real estate debt scenarios.

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