One out of every five mortgages in America is now “under water,” that is, the value of a home has dropped below the amount remaining on a mortgage. Millions of homes have been foreclosed on since the onset of the recession, and the crisis has not abated: One of every 45 homes received at least one foreclosure filing during 2011. (Click here if you need foreclosure help.)

The collapse of the U.S. housing bubble in 2007 caused a subprime mortgage crisis that quickly spread throughout the housing industry. Houses now have lost a third of their pre-crisis value and trillions of dollars of household wealth have been destroyed. Diminished household wealth, and the difficulty in obtaining credit from troubled financial firms have caused consumers to cut back sharply on spending, slowed economic growth and forced employers to shed jobs and cut wages.