Trillion Dollar Bus

Phyllis Gilpatrick was in a nursing home, recuperating from her third hip surgery, on the day she and her husband refinanced their Brighton house.

She was in no condition for an office closing. So a van whisked her home, where she initialed a pile of loan documents while reclining on her back in a wheelchair.

Signing the documents put Phyllis, a disabled truck dispatcher, and her husband, Donald, a retired trucker, into a subprime loan for $301,500 that would soon double their previous payments and leave them on the brink of foreclosure.

"I was too much worried about the wife and everything," said Donald. "I didn't read the paperwork."

Their story provides a look into the swelling subprime-lending crisis. read more