People are so stupid. Home equity is not a bank account. It is the beginning of folks paying off their homes. People use this money to pay off credit cards? How stupid. If people are going to burn for this...it is their fault.
Actually a HELOC if managed properly is a great way to consolidate and reduce debt to manageable levels.
Instead of having 5-6 credit cards with interest rates of 15-20% and payments 0f $4-600 monthly, you would be able to drop the pmt drastically and reduce the interest rate by 2/3 or more.
The secret then is to have the discipline to NOT again run up the credit cards or use the HELOC as an ATM.