Shared appreciation write downs are being glamorized in today’s finance news. They are pegged as a fix to the economy, a good middle ground between broad based principal write-downs and not doing them at all and even as a fix for the stagnant market. 

I recently chatted with Rick Sharga, executive vice president of Carrington Mortgage Holdings, about the ins and outs of shared appreciation write-downs and whether they live up to the hype. He explained why the newly popularized practice is “making the best of a bad situation” but isn’t the cure-all its proponents make it out to be. 

I used some of his helpful tips in a blog on Monday, but if you can spare about 10 minutes, you can listen to our conversation here.