Wednesday, September 28, 2011

CBS 60 Minutes Video on Robo-signing

For those of you who missed it the first time, or have heard about it and didn't know where to find it, here is the infamous video showing how lenders hired people to forge signatures in order to re-create lost documents.

Click here to view

Thanks to Joyce Potts for this good link!!

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Countrywide protected fraudsters by silencing whistleblowers

Excerpt:

"The mortgage market was struggling in March 2007 when Countrywide promoted Eileen Foster to executive vice president and tapped her to take over the company's mortgage fraud unit.""

"A former loan-underwriting manager in northern California, for example, claimed Countrywide retaliated against her after she sent an email to the company's founder and chief executive, Angelo Mozilo, about questionable lending practices. The ex-manager, Enid Thompson, warned Mozilo in March 2007 that "greedy unethical people" were pressuring workers to approve loans without regard for borrowers' ability to pay, according to a lawsuit in Contra Costa Superior Court."

"Within 12 hours, Thompson claimed, Countrywide executives began a campaign of reprisal, reducing her duties and transferring staffers off her team. Corporate minions, she charged, ransacked her desk, broke her computer and removed her printer and personal things. "

Click here to read part 1

Click here for part 2

Sunday, September 25, 2011

Appraisers Speak at Washington Hearing

Hearing entitled "Mortgage Origination: The Impact of Recent Changes on Homeowners and Businesses"

Wednesday, July 13, 2011

House Committee on Financial Services
Subcommittee on Insurance, Housing and Community Opportunity

Excerpt from Sara Stephens:

"...we believe the work of appraisers is vastly underutilized by mortgage lenders today, and facing severe strain as a result of a conflicted and burdensome regulatory environment. Real estate appraisers are professional analysts of real property markets. They are trained to research and investigate the behaviors of buyers and sellers in the market. An appraisal is a professional service. It is not like a flood certification, which can be generated by a click of a button. Credible appraisals require research, analysis, inspection and rigorous training. They require competence, independence, and ethics.

However, many mortgage lenders, and sadly, some government agency officials, fail to recognize this distinction, helping to promote commoditization of appraisals, as if they were all the same or created equally "


Her testimony is here.


All testimony is here.

Ed: I realize this is old news, but I am posting it here so it can be referred to easily by anyone who wishes to.

Friday, September 9, 2011

Feds say Bank of America worse than Countrywide

Excerpt:

Bank of America Corp.’s story has long been that Countrywide did it. But a lawsuit filed last week by the Federal Housing Finance Agency tells a different tale.

The lawsuit claims that when former Countrywide Financial Corp. CEO Angelo Mozilo marveled at the dizzying recklessness of the mortgage-lending business, he was in fact looking at Charlotte-based Bank of America.

This is perhaps one of the most insulting claims ever leveled in a mortgage-fraud lawsuit. Bank of America would probably feel outraged if it weren’t so overwhelmed with its nauseating plunge on the stock market.

Mozilo has easily eclipsed Enron’s brass as one of the most-hated executives of all time. He has become the poster child for the fraudulent mortgage-lending practices that torpedoed the U.S. banking system and the entire global economy.

Source


Richard Hagar:

"Imagine that. Bank of America doing mortgage deals that even Mozilo found shocking."

Monday, September 5, 2011

US sues 17 banks over MBS sold to Fannie, Freddie

Excerpt:

The FHFA alleges these institutions, their executives and some lead underwriters violated federal securities laws, violated common law, failed to conduct proper due diligence and provided allegedly false information when selling these products.

What the FHFA seeks in recovery will not equal what the GSEs paid for the MBS sold. However, in each suit, the FHFA disclosed how much Fannie and Freddie bought from each particular bank and subsidiary in the case of BofA.

* JPMorgan Chase: $33 billion
* RBS: $30.4 billion
* Countrywide: $26.6 billion
* Merrill Lynch: $24.8 billion
* Deutsche Bank: $14.2 billion
* Credit Suisse: $14.1 billion
* Goldman: $11.1 billion
* Morgan Stanley: $10.5 billion
* HSBC: $6.2 billion
* Bank of America: $6 billion
* BarCap: $4.9 billion
* Citi: $3.5 billion
* Nomura: $2 billion
* Société Générale: $1.3 billion
* First Horizon: $883 million

Source