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The House

Toni Schlesinger, the author of Five Flights Up, has spent the last year visiting and photographing the homes of people who have been hit by the economic crash—people who lost their money, their savings, their terrors, their dream-lives, and their pluck. Step inside their lives with "House Calls."

Hidden in the leafy town of Roosevelt, New Jersey is the home of ...

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The Cleaner

Maria del Piano—professional cleaning lady! “My expenses have gone up, property taxes, everything,” Maria says. "Not my base salary. I’m stymied. I need to raise people’s rates that I have not raised in years. I feel my hands are tied. If I raise them, I’m going to lose them. I’m just like, right now, I’m just really working to pay bills. You know what I’m saying, and I’m doing everything I can.”

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The Rental

“That’s why I’m going to rent this room out. I’m 53, a divorced mother of two. They both live on their own. I’ve been cleaning for 18 years. I work a four-day a week. I have to do at least four jobs a day to bring in $200 a day. My 401-K, now it’s nothing—I’m pretty low on the financial ladder. You might think not because I have a lot of things ...”

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The Shells

“... It looks like a lot, but a lot are just flea market, second hand. I grew up in Jersey City, went as far as high school, I was married by 20. I’ve been on my own for 17 years, meaning divorced. I was an office manager in a tool and dye shop in Bayonne. I decided to stay home with my children. By the time I went back into the work force, computers had taken over. A woman introduced me to numerous friends who took me on as a cleaning person.”

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The Fall

“Mid-September, I was in Europe. I saved up for three years for a vacation of a lifetime. While I was in Europe, America fell apart. I came home to quite a different atmosphere. Friends of mine lost their jobs.”

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The Bounty

“I don’t have health care. I can’t afford health care. It becomes an issue of where do I put my money. Last year I broke my wrist. I was out of work six weeks. I had an operation. After the divorce I had a very small amount of money to put down on a house. I opened a multiple listing book and circled things in my price range. My father worked in the maintenance yard in Jersey City.”

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The Bedroom

“I love being surrounded by beauty. I absolutely do. I’m always inspired by beauty. Just by the beauty that’s either natural or even created by man. Things you know are fun but things are just things.”

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The Climber

“Part of why I love playing out doors. I’m a rock climber. I don’t do Yosemite, the big walls, 24-pitch. I don’t have the money to buy the equipment. It’s quite an endeavor. It takes physical, emotional strength. I need to let go of the stress before I leave the ground. I can’t be thinking about paying a bill or the inability not to pay a bill.

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The Swing

“It’s mediation in motion.”