Former NBA player Latrell Sprewell officially lost his house Monday. From the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel:

A River Hills home belonging to former NBA star Latrell Sprewell was foreclosed on today when he failed to show up in court to contest the action brought by a bank that held his mortgage.

The holder of the mortgage, RBS Citizens Bank, told Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge David Hansher that Sprewell owes $320,284. According to River Hills records, the house is assessed at $610,000 and has an estimated fair market value of $667,980. Spreewell bought the house in 1994 for $405,000.

I know the automatic reaction among fans is to point and laugh at the silly athlete who didn't know how to manage his money, but there's nothing funny about foreclosure. I'm in the process of buying a house, and over half of the houses I walked through were both empty and in a sad state of disrepair as a result of frustrated owners taking it out on their property before losing it to foreclosure, which is becoming a sad trend in my state. After awhile, it's just depressing.

Money mismanagement affects people of all stripes and income levels, and it's sad when it's entirely self-inflicted by somebody who seemingly had it all before letting it slip away. So while some may crack jokes about Spree's regrettable "I've got a family to feed" quote he made while turning down millions of dollars toward the end of his career, I've lost my sense of humor about people losing their homes. Wherever Sprewell is, I feel for him. Former NBA player Latrell Sprewell officially lost his house Monday