ROAD TO RUIN: Mortgage Fraud Scandal Brewing

[FourScore]

Run time: 06:53 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6khYSTqHrqM   Posted on YouTube: May 11, 2009 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: May 12, 2009 By DU Member: FourScore Views on DU: 1610

 

[unpossibles]

1. but... I was told by the TeeVee that this is all the fault of poor people and ACORN

thanks for the video link!

[flamin lib]

2. I was there. I saw this stuff going on.

As a Real Estate agent I worked with loan officers, appraisers and title companies.

I had loan officers (little more than clerks) attempt to falsify lease agreements on existing houses to offset the payments so the buyer could qualify for a new mortgage on a different property.

I had loan officers change the income figures of borrowers.

I saw "no doc" loans that accepted the word of the borrower for their income with no verification--filled out by the loan officer.

I saw appraisers assign values to properties that were completely unreasonable with the justification that they will be worth that much in a few years.

When I found these things out I advised my clients not to accept the loan or the appraisal. I even tried to report them to the proper authorities only to find that if the crime didn't amount to more than $2 mil it was below the radar level.

I spent my last two years in Real Estate talking people OUT of buying houses because I knew they couldn't afford them.

[aquart]

4. Exactly what was being done on Wall Street

To enable account churning. And it was compelled from the top.

If a broker steals $1000 from fifty clients, it costs too much for each of them to complain individually, but he's made a tidy profit.

[FourScore]

7. It's people like you who give the world hope.

Just recently, a couple (with a 2 year old toddler and twins due in 4 weeks) put in an application for my rental property. Their current house was being foreclosed on. They wrote me a letter explaining their predicament with their adjustable rate mortgage. I said I would look at their entire credit history and base my decision on that. (Since they made no mention of previous problems, I assumed they just got swept up in the current mortgage crisis.) It was horrible. These people should have never gotten their current car loan or credit card loans, not to mention a $450,000 house loan. He earned $4500.00 BEFORE taxes with 4 jobs. My husband and I kept shaking our heads and wondering how these people were EVER given such sizable loans. They didn't even earn enough money BEFORE taxes to pay their debts. Get this, they claimed bankruptcy in 2005. Two months later they bought a brand new Expedition with an $800/mo payment and seven months later a $450,000 home with adjustable 5/1 ARM. It was unbelievable.

Now he's going back to school and taking out student loans (God knows how he's getting those).

How did ANYONE give these people a loan? We had to turn them down knowing they would homeless in two weeks with babies on their arms. It was heart-breaking.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

11. I'm a loan officer and I have to agree with you (except the "clerk" part)

We had a VP from Citimortgage in our office coaching us how to make up "reasonable" income for stated income borrowers.

Fortunately, I work for a pretty reputable guy who really discouraged that kind of thing so we made it out of the meltdown intact - as a matter of fact, we are thriving.

That said, we did fire a few of the sleaziest and the other marginal ones drifted off in to the sunset when the stated income loans disappeared.

[flamin lib]

12. Sorry to have painted with a broad brush. Loan officers are

licensed professionals but it has been my experience that, like Real Estate Agents, many stretch the definition of "professional". Both professions try to police themselves with varying degrees of success.

There were, as you said, high executives driving the "creative lending" that got so many people in trouble. In defense of many LOs they often had a boss breathing down their neck demanding that they meet quota. The rational was, "If you don't write this loan, somebody else will," and "If you want to keep making YOUR mortgage, I suggest you write more loans."

I faced that sort of pressure--if I didn't help with the purchase they'd just fire me and get another agent who would. I had a family to feed and mortgage to make too. Fortunately for me my wife's income made it possible to take the high road. I fired more than one client because they simply weren't reasonable in their expectations.

[HowHasItComeToThis]

3. FILL THE JAILS

[jimmybama]

5. Fill the Jails?

You would have to kick out the pot smokers to have enough room
for the mortgage culprits. I thought martha Stewart was the
most corrupt of the marketeers and she has (the only one) done
her time.

[ljm2002]

8. You thought *Martha Stewart* was the most corrupt?????

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

Puhleeze.

She got nailed for lying to an investigator, which she did because she got scared. And she subsequently corrected her statement. And they still decided to pursue the case against her, even though there are bigger cases every day, every hour of every day.

Her so-called "insider trading" netted her about $20K, and was a tip that was given to her unsolicited.

And from that you surmised that she was the most corrupt?

Wow, you must have been living under a rock. Sorry to get personal, but Geeze, Louise!

[DCKit]

9. What jimmy said ^.

Set my people free! We need room for the real criminals.

[sce56]

6. Yep I have said it before the crooks were at all levels

Sold the house in 04 looked like it was not going to go for that almost double the price bought two years before but the agent got with his partner and they found a buyer both husband and wife were making just above min wage and were lied to about how much the payments wre going to be four months later they were introuble with a loan pay ment more than double what they copuld afford! The kicker in it was the agent who represneted them was a relative! Needless to say they lost the home in less than a year!

[Wednesdays]

10. K&R

:kick: