The simple truth was and is that I was excited about the prospect of making the REST Report available to homeowners. I’d worked for ten months to make it available, and it was ten months with a front row seat to the ongoing tragic scene that has become the foreclosure crisis. (And look… it’s working even better than I thought it would, so what would you do in my position, sit quietly?)
For over a year I’ve known that the crux of the issue for homeowners trying to get a Loan Modification under the federal government’s HAMP program has been the shrouded mystery of the NPV Analysis. The Net Present Value (NPV) calculation is the KEY component of determining whether or not the homeowner gets a trial, and ultimately, a permanent loan modification under the HAMP program. That mystery is now GONE!!
The US housing market will face another retreat while mortgage-backed securities and Treasurys are likely to go through a “material” correction, Meredith Whitney, CEO of Meredith Whitney Advisory Group, told CNBC Tuesday.
Fresh off the press of the 2nd District Court of Appeals, today the 2nd DCA issued a stunning shot across the bow of US financial institutions by reversing a trial court’s decision to grant summary judgment in favor of US Bank, NA.
There is a recent decision out of the Sixth Judicial Circuit in FL (Pinellas County) that I believe warrants focus and analysis for homeowners and their attorneys. In Wachovia Mortgage v. Matacchiero, the Defendant filed a Motion to Dismiss (MTD) the case through her attorney. The basic premise of the MTD was that the Plaintiff lacked [...]
The bottom line is that most judges in Florida and other states trample on the civil rights of homeowners and deny them due process because of their “personal views” on the issues of foreclosure. I highly encourage homeowners to organize in their communities and march on the steps of their local courthouse and protest what their elected judges are doing and not doing to uphold the law as Judge Schack is doing in this case.
I have a lot of conversations with people about our economy, foreclosures and such… from clients to friends in business to attorneys. Everyone who’s asked me what I foresee coming I’ve told them that 2010 will be a very tough year and they better prepare now. We aren’t done yet folks… and the policies of the Obama Administration and our collective disaster we call Congress, are going to make things even worse – and very well will extend the recession quite painfully. I have told people to expect another wave of foreclosures. As long as you have no job creation and more job loss happening every day, this cycle won’t stop. It’s as simple as that.
This ruling could ultimately end up being the demise of ALL foreclosure actions involving securitized loans. One thing is clear in that the federal court identifies the investors as the owners of the loan and is so doing the court also recognizes that the servicer/intermediaries/pretender lender have no authority to do ANYTHING in the way of enforcement, modification, collection through legal means such as a foreclosure action because they simply have no standing (the alleged debt is not owed to anyone other than the investors).
…the loan servicers don’t care about anything but money and the modus operandi is clear… foreclose as fast as possible on everyone. Just modify enough loans to make everyone think we’re really on board with this. Make excuses for everything else.
I realized this morning that it’s been a while since I’ve covered the basics of foreclosure defense. For those of you readers who are behind in their mortgage and trying to work something out with the lender (who is usually just the servicer of your loan, not the owner), you must beware that MOST of these institutions do not deal with you, the homeowner in good faith. Every time I see the news media covering some ridiculous thing they call “reporting” of the facts, fair and balanced or whatever, what they “report” is that banks are hurting, the government is going to save the “people” from this mess and servicers are doing everything they can to help. Call this number, call that number and you’ll get help. Go to this government site, or that for more information… yadda yadda yadda.
In the state of Florida, there is extensive established law that prevents summary judgment from being granted when there are outstanding issues of material fact. Johnson v. Boca Raton Community Hosp., Inc., 985 So.2d 141, Murphy v. Young Men’s Christian Association of Lake Wales, Inc., 974 So.2d 565. A “material fact,” for summary judgment purposes, is a fact that is essential to the resolution of the legal questions raised in the case, Continental Concrete, Inc. v. Lakes at La Paz III Ltd. Partnership, 758 So.2d 1214.
Did you know that over 98% of all people who are served with a foreclosure suit or notice of default do NOTHING to defend themself in the process? That’s a fact.
WE are all learning, to our deep distress, how the perpetual pursuit of profits drove so many of the bad decisions that financial institutions made during the mortgage mania.
But while investors tally the losses that were generated by loose lending so far, the impact of another lax practice is only beginning to be seen. That is the big banks’ minimalist approach to meeting legal requirements — bookkeeping matters, really — when pooling thousands of loans into securitization trusts.
Stated simply, the notes that underlie mortgages placed in securitization trusts must be assigned to those trusts soon after the firms create them. And any transfers of these notes must also be recorded.
But this seems not to have been a priority with many big banks. The result is that bankruptcy judges are finding that institutions claiming to hold the notes that back specific mortgages often cannot prove it.
Unfortunately, unless you represent borrowers, the vast flow of notes into the maw of the securitization industry meant that a lot of mistakes were made. When the borrower defaults, the party seeking to enforce the obligation and foreclose on the underlying collateral sometimes cannot find the note. A lawyer sophisticated in this area has speculated to one of the authors that perhaps a third of the notes “securitized” have been lost or destroyed. The cases we are going to look at reflect the stark fact that the unnamed source’s speculation may be well-founded.
Today’s NY Times report on Quants, if you read it carefully, will tell you a lot about how Wall Street almost pulled off the perfect crime. In fact, the complexity of the derivatives they created and the complex structure of personnel involved in their creation and valuation created a level of plausible deniability beyond the reach and beyond the comprehension of the newbie B-School graduates sitting at regulatory agencies, not having the faintest idea what they were looking at. Small wonder, Greenspan admitted that he didn’t understand them either but did nothing in 2005 because he was afraid of a global economic collapse, high unemployment, crashing industries and a general swoon in asset prices from housing to stocks. In hindsight he and everyone else admits we would have been far better off if we had bitten the bullet then than now. By allowing the problem to grow the fall was longer and deeper.
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