Bloomberg provided a useful update on the 50 state attorney generals’ investigation into mortgage abuses. One key development is that the AGs are treating investors as parties whose interests need to be considered. This appears to be at odds with the approach taken by Federal regulators, who are devising and implementing exams of various sorts […]
Read more...Felix Salmon reports on a conversation with departing assistant Treasury Secretary Michael Barr on newly-commenced reviews of the practices of bank servicers. Barr’s patter might sound convincing to the uninformed. An “11-agency, 8-week review of servicer practices, with hundreds of investigators crawling all over the banks”! Promises to hold miscreants accountable! Banks required to fix […]
Read more...It was predictable, as soon as the press took notice of a potentially very damaging bit of testimony by a Countrywide manager, that its parent, Bank of America, would do everything in its power to deny its validity. By way of brief background (see here, here, and here for more detail), a recent court decision […]
Read more...By Thomas Cox, a retired bank lawyer in Portland, Maine who serves as the Volunteer Program Coordinator for the Maine Attorney’s Saving Homes (MASH) program, cross posted from New Deal 2.0 Back in September, I was asked to give some unusual advice to a client. This woman, a resident of rural Northwestern Maine, wanted to […]
Read more...There is a great post by Adam Levitin at Credit Slips which discusses the implications of the fact that a recent court decision in Kemp v. Countrywide Home Loans, Inc. stated that Countrywide had not transferred the note (the borrower IOU) to the Bank of New York, trustee for the securitization trust. Perhaps more important, […]
Read more...Some readers may have been unhappy with my failure to comment on a Washington Post article late last week about a push by the mortgage registry service, MERS, to “legalize” its activities. Even though the article indicates that dollars are being thrown at lobbyists to sell the MERS version of reality in DC, their approach […]
Read more...By Tom Adams, an attorney and former monoline executive On Sunday, the New York Times reported on a recent case known as Kemp vs. Countrywide. In it, the judge in his decision states that for the mortgage loan in question in the case, a Countrywide employee testified that the mortgage note had never been delivered […]
Read more...Testimony in a New Jersey bankruptcy court case provides proof of the scenario we’ve depicted on this blog since September, namely, that subprime originators, starting sometime in the 2004-2005 timeframe, if not earlier, stopped conveying note (the borrower IOU) to mortgage securitization trust as stipulated in the pooling and servicing agreement. Professor Adam Levitin in […]
Read more...I’ve taken a particular interest in GMAC because in the one consumer foreclosure case I ‘ve attended, back in May, I had the dubious pleasure of seeing a GMAC employee and an attorney for the local foreclosure mill, who was also put on the stand, perjure themselves. And this isn’t my interpretation; documentary evidence was […]
Read more...One of the many themes being used to cultivate class warfare in foreclosure-land is the idea that people who are losing their homes are getting an unfair break. Many of them have learned that banks are moving very slowly on foreclosures and so they stay put until the sheriff evicts them. One culprit is crowded […]
Read more...On Thursday, the housing subcommittee of the House Financial Services Committee held hearings on robo signing, documentation, and servicing issues. This session wasa companion to the Senate Banking Committee hearings on the same topic earlier in the week. There were some notable differences between the two forums. The House group overall was less well prepared; […]
Read more...By Matt Stoller, a blogger-turned Congressional staffer. He was a policy advisor to Rep. Alan Grayson on financial policy issues. Cross posted from New Deal 2.0. A lot of people forget that having debt you can’t pay back really sucks. Debt is not just a credit instrument, it is an instrument of political and economic […]
Read more...The MSNBC show Last Word had a segment on servicer abuses in foreclosures. It’s good to see this issue start to get traction in the MSM. Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Read more...The Wall Street Journal real estate blog reports that Federal banking regulators will conduct an examination of MERS, the electronic mortgage and servicing rights data service (hat tip ForeclosureHamlet). As much as scrutiny of MERS is very much in order, it remains an open question as to whether this effort is serious. One impetus for […]
Read more...Given the ability of banks to muscle through all sorts of favorable legislation, there was good reason to be concerned about the sudden reappearance of HR 3808, the Interstate Recognition of Notarization Act. While this measure has been long sought by trial lawyers, many observers were understandibly concerned that this measure might serve to be […]
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