November 19, 2010
Robo-Foreclosures
One of the big problems with the robo-signing scandal is that documents that were basically batch-signed with witness and notary signatures being added to thousands of pages every day are used to take people’s homes. Huge title clearing companies executed tens of thousands of assignments of mortgage, transferring ownership of a loan from one company to another. These transfers supposedly then gave the right to foreclose on the property to the bank or servicer which received the assignment from the previous financial institution.
The financial literacy of the people signing these transfers, though, is shockingly low. In the depositions taken of employees of Nationwide Title Clearing, it is clear that they do not know what a mortgage is, what a promissory note is for, or what a mortgage assignment does. And these documents were used to transfer ownership of the loans to mortgage companies that then used the paperwork to initiate foreclosure proceedings and prove that they had the legal right to take the properties back.
While the actions that Nationwide and other title clearing companies have taken may be perceived as legal, these organizations are another sign of how unethical and manipulative of the court system the banking industry has become. The employees of the title company were given authorization to sign as vice presidents of various financial companies and mortgage companies. Employees may have been counted as vice presidents “for signing purposes only” of dozens of financial institutions and banks.
Welcome to the vice president's office. VP of which bank? All of them!
Using titles such as vice president on mortgage assignments is nothing more than an attempt to make the documents look more official. A judge is more likely to believe in the legitimacy of a mortgage assignment signed by a “vice president” than if it was signed by “some person sitting in a cubicle who doesn’t know what a promissory note is but signs 4,000 of them every day.” The minor fact that the title company employees never received a check or had any contact at all with the mortgage companies they represented is also not usually disclosed in foreclosure proceedings.
The banks take the position that, even with all of the misrepresentation and manipulation of the courts through dubious documentary evidence, the outcome would be the same. Even if the banks did not take various short cuts to prove legal ownership of the promissory note and mortgage, the homeowners would still be in foreclosure and would lose their homes anyway. So what’s the big deal with all of these robo-signed documents, anyway? They don’t change anything.
And maybe the banks are right. But maybe they’re not. Maybe, if just one or who people had actually taken a look at the documents before rushing straight into foreclosure, someone would have thought of the homeowners are human beings, instead of just more signatures to be dealt with. The robo-mortgage-approval, robo-document-signing and robo-foreclosing processes banks engage in are designed to dehumanize the process of giving loans as much as possible, treating each home and property owner as nothing more than a piece of paper to be transferred, signed off on, or executed in the fastest way possible.
Written by: nick
Filed Under: Featured, News and Analysis
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Dr. Gerald Pearlman
November 26, 2010 at 2:27 pm
I have filed a criminal complaint for illegal foreclosure on two properties.
I filed a complaint with the Office of Thrift Supervision in April 2006 relative to fraud committed by WaMu. An investigation was done and the OTS agreed with everything we alledged. Instead of taking regulatory action they told us to sue the bank.
In August of 2008 we had filed a Notice of Recession and offered to Quit Claim back one of the properties as it has 2 Million in construction defects. The bank was put on notice by one of its’ employees, Theresa Hagman, about issues with the Developer and the fact that custom construction did not have the funds to complete the loans. She was fired and filed a wrongful termaination lawsuit and won 1.5 Million. We read about it in the paper
(http://www.seattlepi.com/business/296841_wamu22.html, http://www.consumeraffairs.com/finance/wamu_construcln.html
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/2003491694_wamu23.html
We were about to settle with WaMu and were told by the attorneys for WaMu to stop making the payments and that they were going to reconvey over the properties to us as a settlelment if we would not discuss the settlement and talk to our neighbors who also had WaMu construction loans at the time. Then the OTS came in and took over WaMu. The FDIC transfer all assest to JP Morgan Chase. Months later we finally heard back from the attorneys and they stated that settlelment agreement was no longer valid as Chase took over the assets but not the liabilites.
Subsequently we were put on notice of default for both properties. I was able to stall the foreclsorue process for over a year no thanks to my attorneys who could not figure out anything.
Finally the properties were foreclosed on two weeks ago. However, the bank could not come up with a single document related to our loans in over a year making several “Qualified Requests” and “Requests for Verification of Debt.”
I made a similar request for a friend who was with WaMu / Chase but his loan was after 2007. They produced his entire loan package within 5 day and made a loan modification within 10 days.
Loans prior to 2007 were sold on multiple occassion and securitized.
When Chase foreclosed on my properties they did not have ownership or a servicing agreement with the loan holder. In essence they sold property that they did not own. “Selling Stolen Property” a felony!
We are prosecuting the matter and it has been moved up to majore crimes. The houses are now evidence in a criminal matter and cannot be touched. An injunction is going to be ordered by the Judge next week and the properties will be held by the Sheriff’s Department / Court until the investigatin and probable trial.
The FDIC had no right to transfer my properties as we had filed a notice of recession and there was “Fraud in Factum.” which I learned about from this site.
Further, the FDIC did not have the ability to transfer Assets that WaMu did not own and the new owners of the loans had no servicing agreement with the holder of the note.
Now comes another question. What are the banks doing with payments on properties where there is no servicing agreement and they do not know who owns the loans?
I will keep you posted as we progress.
Dr. Pearlman