Matt Weidner – Fighting For The American People

Posts Tagged ‘citimortgage’

Remember first of all that the banks are not private corporations, at least not in any true sense of the word.

The banks, by virtue of the extraordinary bailouts and taxpayer funding that every man woman, child, grandchild and great grandchild living in this country or that will be born for generations, are effectively wards of the state…..and by extension of The People.

How is it that we as taxpayers shoveled trillions upon trillions of our hard-earned taxpayer dollars at these institutions and we don’t so much as get a puny stock certificate or anything?

Instead, the banks continue to kick the American people straight in the face…they continue punching us all

directly in the gut.  But some state attorney generals are not putting up with it any longer……

California’s AG tells the banks to treat homeowners fairly.

Nevada’s AG indicts robosigners.

Michigan’s AG issues subpoenas to document processors.

New York’s AG opens major investigations…..

THEN>>>>>>>>

Massachusetts AG drops a nuclear bomb of a major lawsuit against ALL THE MAJOR BANKSTERS….. I love the way it starts out:

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts, by and through its Attorney General,
Martha Coakley, brings this enforce me t action to hold multiple banks accountable for
their rampant violations of Massachusetts law and associated unfair and deceptive
conduct amidst the foreclosure crisis that has gripped Massachusetts and the nation since
2007.

In or around October 2010, evidence of the Bank Defendants’ failure to
comply with the strict requirements of the affidavit and notary procedures became widely
known Proceedings in state and bankruptcy courts as well as filings with various
registries of deeds revealed the pervasive use of mortgage servicer employees to sign
hundreds — in some eases thousands — of affidavits and other sworn statements without
any personal knowledge of the information contained in the affidavits.

Further flouting the affidavit and notarization, requirements, the affiiant’s
signature was frequently notarized on foreclosure documents without any verification by
the notary as to the affiants identity and without the affiant even being present.,

Evidence has since indicated that these practices were not confined to the
foreclosure context, but were also employed for documents concerning the creation,
assignment, transfer, modification, and discharge of mortgages secured by property in
Massachusetts,

The Bank Defendants knew or should have known that their failure to
comply with Massachusetts foreclosure law, including, without limitation, initiating and
conducting foreclosures without being the present holder of the m rtgage and the use of
false documentation practices to facilitate foreclosures, was unfair and deceptive.

Each of the Bank Defendants, through their employees and/or agents, filed
or caused to be tiled with registries of deeds and courts, documents that w re false, failed
to comply with the requirements for affidavits concerning personal knowledge, and failed
to conform to the law governing notarization. Discovery in this action will identify the
precise number of violations by each Bank Defendant.

The Bank Defendants frequently represent to borrowers and the public that
they are actively assisting distressed borrowers. Each of their websites contains links for
“Help for Homeowners” or “Homeowner Assistance,” and include promises such as that
on the Bank of America website, which states: “Let’s work together; Help is available for
homeowners experiencing payment difficulties. We’ll do everything possible to come up
with a solution to help you. No matter what your situation is, we’re here to help;” or, as
the Citi website states, “if you are having trouble making payments on your mortgage,
CitiMortgage will work with you to find a mortgage solution;” or, as the Wells Fargo
website states, “Count on us to work with you.”

Instead, however, upon information and belief, each of the Bank. Defendants
has deceived Massachusetts borrowers about loan modification requirements, by, without
limitation., misrepresenting that:
Borrowers must be over sixty days.. delinquent to get a loan modification,
When in fact actual delinquency is not required. Borrowers may be eligible
even if they are at simply at risk of imminent default. Such
misrepresentations resat in increased and unnecessary defaults.
If borrowers are over ninety days delinquent they will receive priority
treatment,. which is false; and which results in unnecessary additional
defaults and extended delinquencies.
Certain borrowers cannot be – considered based oil the type or seasonal,.
nature of their income, When in fact such factors are not determinative of
eligibility. This -results in borrowers who otherwise may qualify for a loan
modification being improperly denied Or dissuaded from applying.

Each of the Batik Defendants knew or should have known that its
misrepresentations regarding its loan modification programs are deceptive and unfairly
disqualify borrowers from obtaining loan modifications.

The Bank Defendants routinely make misrepresentations to borrowers
and/or their counsel regarding pending foreclosure proceedings, including, among other
misrepresentations, that while loan modification negotiations are occurring, foreclosure
proceedings will not continue and/or that foreclosure auctions will be postponed. As
negotiations progress, however, borrowers and/or their counsel often learn, whether
through public notices or communications with other employees or agents of the relevant
Bank Defendant, that the foreclosure auctions are continuing as scheduled.

Each of the Bank Defendants knows or should know that its
misrepresentations regarding foreclosure proceedings are deceptive and misleading, and
result in harm to borrowers.

Read the full Massachusetts Complaint

The following is a quote from an expert in the whole fraudclosure scandal:

“It is now widely recognized that MERS facilitated fraud by lenders, servicers, foreclosers and securitizers. Even on the most charitable interpretation it is very difficult to believe that MERS was not fraudulent by design. So much of the story has already been told that we do not need to rehash all of it here. Let me first concisely summarize the two main problems, and then move on to the most recent developments that put the final nails in MERS’s coffin. I’ll conclude with my argument that there really was some “not so intelligent” design behind all of this. But it is coming back to bite the hand that feeds. The big banks will not survive the monster they created.”

Huffington Post

The picture above is another million dollar example of foreclosure slop. The home, located at 101 21st Avenue North in St. Petersburg Florida was once a proud and beautiful example of residential beauty.  It sits on three large lots in one of the nicest areas of town.  Just a few short years ago, it’s lush tropical landscape and interesting gardens made it the jewel of the street.  Today it’s a vacant and crumbling eyesore, a blight on the neighborhood.  The foreclosure mills have made such a mess out of the foreclosure, that the home will have to be re-foreclosed before it can ever be sold. But it’s such a mess that I predict it will just fall into continued disrepair and be liquidated for next to nothing.  Here’s the anatomy of this foreclosure mess:

Have a look at the property appraiser card for this property, gorrellpropertyappraiser

12/26/2007, David Stern Enterprises, (DJSP) on behalf of Citimortgage, filed a foreclosure. gorrellcitilis

1/18/2008, Shapiro and Fishman, on behalf of HSBC file a second foreclosure on the same property. gorrellhsbclis

2/01/2008, HSBC files affidavit swearing they cannot get personal service on the defendants.

3/13/2008, Scott Anderson/MERS executes assignment of mortgage from Delta to HSBC. gorrellassign

9/11/2008, Court enters Order of Dismissal, dismissing the HSBC foreclosure. gorrellmasterdismissal

9/11/2008, Court enters Order of Dismissal, dismissing the Citi foreclosure. gorrellmasterdismissalciti

4/16/2010, Court enters Final Judgment of Foreclosure to HSBC for $1 million. gorrelljudgment

4/24/2009, Citi files a Voluntary Dismissal. gorrelldocket

6/24/2010, Court issues Certificate of Title to HSBC Bank. gorrellCT

To the untrained eye, all those documents and the chain of slop and mistakes may not mean much, but the title work on this property will give any experienced title attorney nightmares.  It’s just a mess on top of a mess, topped off with an unresolvable mess.  It’s hard to tell what’s the worst thing about all this.  Is it the fact that the judgment is void or voidable as to the Defendants Gorrell due to the improper service?  The post-filing assignment of mortgage?  The questionable veracity of the HSBC Assignment?  HSBC ignoring the Citi Lis Pendens?  The code enforcement liens?

I’m going to keep watching this property to see what becomes of it.  HSBC claims they’ve paid $35,000 in property taxes on the home and $19,000 in homeowner’s insurance.  The taxes work out to $11,000 per year, so HSBC will keep eating those taxes for years to come.

The irony of the whole thing is I alerted the foreclosure mill attorney to the problems with this file more than a year ago….it would have been easy enough to resolve some of the problems if anyone cared enough to put the time into the file, but you know….in this rush to push these cases through….who has the time to do things correctly…..there’s another even more messed up foreclosure that I’ll share with everyone later….

Dear Members of The Citi Board of Directors and Citi Senior Leadership Commitee:

I’ve got about $2 million dollars sitting on my desk here in Little ‘ole St. Petersburg….and it’s yours for the taking…..but you big shots apparently don’t want it.

You see I’ve got contracts pending or potential offers on houses here where (at least apparently) Citi holds mortgages on the property.  Now the rough combined principle value of the outstanding mortgages is $2.5 million, so you would be taking (at least on the surface) a bit of a loss if you accepted the money on my desk….but you’re going to take much bigger losses if you don’t accept the money sitting on the table.

Take the home pictured above….you guys have two mortgages on the home totaling $500,000….now months ago you might have gotten offers that would have netted you $400,000, but the market has continued to decline and the offers now would net you $300,000.  You owe or have paid $21,000 in property taxes over the last two years and by the time you get it back in foreclosure, you’re probably going to spend tens of thousands of dollars so I just don’t see how you’ll net even $300,000.

Here’s the damdest thing about this particular house….YOU’RE GETTING SCREWED BY YOUR OWN ATTORNEYS ON THIS ONE. No need to go into details on this, the bottom line is the homeowner filed for bankruptcy long ago and disclaimed any interest in the property he had…….your attorneys could have concluded this long ago…your “loss mitigators” could have gotten you money long ago, but they’re all sitting on their hands….I’ve been taunting them….emailing them…asking why they don’t want to get this property back for you….but nothing from any one of them…I’ve emailed your state court attorneys, your federal bankruptcy attorneys, your senior loss mitigation staff….but not a peep out of them other than to acknowledge receipt of my email.

This situation is not unique….I’ve got many just like this…and Citi is not unique…I’ve got literally millions of dollars worth of money sitting on the table that could go to banks like Citi, Wells Fargo, OneWest and Bank of America….the homeowners don’t care anymore (and frankly don’t have anything to lose.)

They’re totally ready to get on with their lives…give you guys money and get the property off their hands and into the hands of someone who can use it….so I’m asking you people….all you smart men and women that are tagged on this post.  Hopefully your staff will be monitoring tags and blogs and that sort of thing….I’m just hoping that one of you will be curious enough about what I’ve got to say that you might contact me….remember, you folks do answer to shareholders don’t you?

Can you all just afford to turn money like this away?  Is the government cheese, tax breaks and subsidies you’re living on just too good?

I currently have several files in my office where buyers with cash or with solid financing have made solid offers on properties that are in foreclosure. By solid I mean offers that will net the mortgage lender something like 75-80% of the balance of the mortgage on the home.  It is absolutely maddening that I cannot get an approval from the mortgage holders for any of these properties.

Bank of America- The Evil Wizard Behind Them All?

I had some hope that Bank of America’s new short sale processing interface, called “Equator” was going to be a more efficient processor of short sale transactions, but my hope is starting to fade.  While the system does seem to more efficiently process the paperwork (at least now BofA acknowledges receipt of paperwork), the problem is the same old bad decision making is in the system, (“Our appraisal says the home is worth $500,000.”) Problem is your appraisal is just dead wrong, oh and by the way your appraiser didn’t even make it in the neighborhood to inspect the home.

After waiting months for an approval on a second mortgage payoff from Bank of America, we were pounding the phones at CitiMortgage trying desperately to get approval on a first mortgage held by Citi.  After weeks of frustration, the monsters at Citi informed us that they were waiting approval from their investor….Bank of America.  We finally got an answer back…after three months and after we had already brought a higher contract in…BofA changed the terms, refused to pay fees and is now demanding a higher payoff price? Why, because the market’s gotten better?

The irony about this particular file  is neither Bank of America or Citi have a good mortgage on the property.  Both used the wrong legal description when they closed and fixing the mistake will take at least a year.  Like their mortgages, the entire system is broken down in a big, big way.  It will undoubtedly take years to fix….if ever?

Think a Short Sale Or Deed in Lieu Will Work?  The Numbers Do Not Look Good.

The State Foreclosure Prevention Working Group consists of 12 state attorneys general (Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio, Texas and Washington), bank regulators for New York, North Carolina, and Maryland, and the Conference of State Bank Supervisors.  Their report, issued just this January and which can be found here confirms that the short sale process is broken as the numbers of filed foreclosures continues to rise, and the number of “stalled” foreclosures continues to increase.  Put simply a “stalled” foreclosure is one that has not been completed in a timely basis.  The report indicates that short sales account for just 12% of foreclosure resolutions while deed in lieu’s account for less than one percent.

Citi Mortgage made a dramatic announcement on December 17, 2009 shouting that they were suspending foreclosure activity across the country.  A copy of that annoucement can be found here and the Citi website can be found here.

While that sounds dramatic and wonderful and all that, the absurd thing about it is this dramatic program only affects 4,000 people at most out of a loan portfololio that totals more than $746 billion dollars.  As an example of how the press picks up on such a story and acts as if the announcement has any significance, see the attached article from the Tampa Tribune.

Just add this magnificent program and dramatic announcement to the dozens of other ones I’ve written about on this blog that have little or no practical affect for consumers who are hurting.

THE ANNOUNCEMENT IS A SCAM BEING PERPETRATED BY THE COMPANY ON CONSUMERS AND POLICY MAKERS AND WILL HAVE LITTLE OR NO AFFECT ON THE PROBLEMS FACED BY EVEN THOSE 4,000 THEY CLAIM TO BE TARGETING!

If you’re in trouble, don’t count on a program or announcement….hire an attorney who will fight like hell for you.  www.mattweidnerlaw.com