English law, which is the basis of our country states that the Sheriff is the law of the county. Fraud is fraud, whether you commit it in California or Florida. I hope this task-force has legs.

Now, if Eric (Place)holder steps in and shuts down his investigation, we all can guess what the answer is.

In addition to deliberate fraud designed to maximize those mortgage related fees, a ton of it is just plain old sloppy work on the part of the banks and the servicers.

Here it is a nutshell folks...

You do a mortgage through Bank of America...they collect your info...then electronically send it to a third party that does all of the verification. Once completed, they send it back to BOA.

That's how it works people. These 3rd party processors hire bottom-of-the-barrel (mostly temp) workers to push the paperwork...and I mean the absolute bottom...you would be furious if you knew who has 100% access to everything you submit for a mortgage or refi...you should see the parking lot...no BMW's here...every 10th car has duct tape and plastic for at least one window..I was stunned the other day when I spotted an 80's era Chevy citation...amazing!

Cell phones are not allowed at the employees desk and taking anything home is forbidden...but...there are hundreds of these low-ballers and supervision is a joke...if someone wants to take a pic of your data...they most certainly can.

These mills push for volume...if you don't process x cases per day, you're in trouble...so the goal of the employee is to finish and be just accurate enough so it doesn't come back on them...the focus is STILL on volume...not accuracy...this whole mortgage thing is a total mess.

Time for a blanket pardon from the executive.

As long as this guy stays on this path we need to help him. Getting it started at the county level seems to me our best shot. Way to many counties for the banks to litigate. This game changes when we start tossing fancy NY lawyers in jail.

I believe MERS was illegal in that it transfered ownership of deeds outside the official county deed transfer and fee process. That said, I see zero chance any large scale legal ruling forcing banks and paper traders to pay these fees retro or otherwise address this will ever happen. They made MERS too big to fail and if any of this stuff ever gets legs, there will be a "fix" offered to make all this go away in the same manner all financial problems are handled these days. I see no reason to spend energy pushing this.

Debtpie, I can tell you from personal experience, you can't hire morons to do loan packages. A good processor was $40K to $50K a year 25 years ago. You could get a loan processed for $250 to $300 in 1993, because I was in the business. Getting the 1003 filled out correctly and the package in order takes some brains. My sister has operated in the business for 30 years. Skilled help is expensive and hard to find. Despite the recent past, you are still packaging a marketable security. Maybe they have it down to where morons can do it. I seriously doubt it, especially if things have changed in the business toward quality control.

What is a Marketable security? Matt Wiedner has some things to say about that. Sorry I dont know how or if I can link stuf from his site.
What he is saying the answer may be NO.

"Debtpie, I can tell you from personal experience, you can't hire morons to do loan packages"

"A good processor was $40K to $50K a year 25 years ago."

LOL! You are woefully out of touch on this one or maybe we are on different pages? I'm not talking the about the loan processor that works for Bank of America...I'm talking about the people that make the phone calls to verify employment, income, do the background checks, the credit history, etc.,...all of that nitty gritty work is not done by the banks employees...they farm that out to these mills I'm describing.

The whole 3rd party moron crew makes $10 an hour or less (no benefits); management makes $30k to $40K a year...and I have a family member in management...that is how I know this.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"especially if things have changed in the business toward quality control."

Current "quality control" is actually taking the time to verify the applicants ability to pay...although this accuracy is dubious from these 3rd party mills as the pressure is to process first and be accurate second.

The scariest part is just the people that have full access to everything you submit with the application...you would not be happy if you knew who they were....many work less than a month..they come in as temps...low pay, crappy work...hell with this...Lovely.

Quote:

... every 10th car has duct tape and plastic for at least one window..

Stop talking about my car! (You think I'm kidding - I'm not!)

More "couldn't make this **** up" - http://silvervigilante.com/jpmorgan-comp....

"People have a right to be protected in their homes."

We need more people like this sherriff!

Debt, my family has been in the real estate or mortgage business for over 40 years. I spent several years in the business myself. You can't get a manager for a Jack in the Box for $40K a year. Countrywide servicing happens to be based here. I'm sure I could find out. Median income for Plano Texas is supposed to be the highest in the US for a city over 200,000. I doubt they are hiring help that cheap here. The people that make the phone calls might be a different group than underwrite the loans or package them. I do understand a lot of this stuff has been automated, but it takes a pretty competent person to look at the file and see it is in good order. The flow of loan paper can be a real pain in the ass if the paper isn't right. I doubt they are passing much junk at this time, as there aren't too many in that industry that will take a burn the second time and BAC doesn't want more bad paper back. I am not a person that is foreign to the process.

Also, all that stuff you mention is backed up by paper copies of paystubs, w-2's, income tax returns (along with a verification signed at closing giving permission of the lender to verify with the IRS the copies are correct), bank statements and all stamped with a certification they are true and correct copies. It would make sense to get a moron to make the phone calls and the pay you mention likely fits the bill. Software made a lot of the headaches of processing easier. It isn't a high IQ job, but you can't get an incompetent idiot to do it, as I have seen it tried over and over again.

I volunteered to do some processing for my sister, when she was up a tree over some overpaid idiot she had hired who couldn't figure out the new system. For whatever reason she turned me down, maybe that it would take time to explain how the new nonsense worked. I was in the business when the verifications where mailed and signed and you had to do 1008's and 1003's on a typewriter. The copy stuff was a real breeze in comparison. I ran a one man shop for awhile in the early 90's and did all my own processing. I was told I did good files and rarely did I need anything but some minor corrections on my 1003's. I worked for a former FNMA underwriter from the 1970's. Then, FNMA approved all loans and mistakes went to the bottom of the stack. Now, I understand it all goes over the internet in a file. No more couriering files, making triple copies (sometimes 4). I can see where a lot of it can be cheapened, but there has to be a competent person in a few spots.

As for the Sheriff, I would have to imagine he is in position to make trouble for the bankers, being all this stuff happens in the county in which the property resides. Could be a new level of officials the bankers are going to have to buy off, should this trend get started. There are a hell of a lot more than 500 of them nationwide.

I have duck tape on my front bumper!

I was doing a little business at a teller's window at the bank a week ago last Friday (payday for many). From where I stood, I could see the drive-thru teller lanes. Out of 6 or 7 vehicles, one was a city water department truck but three of the other vehicles had plastic and duct tape covering a space where glass was missing. Yesterday, I was in line at the window at Burger King (yeah, I know) and the car behind me had plastic and duct tape for the rear windshield. Must be what's in fashion. Maybe clear plastic and silver are the new black.

You see it all the time in Philadelphia - it's usually the result of smash-and-grab robberies if you park your car on the street.

I just found out that this Sheriff attended the Las Vegas Constitutional Sheriff Conference in January.

http://www.countysheriffproject.org/

There is another convention in September:

http://www.countysheriffproject.org/15-c....

Mann,
A few months ago I was attempting to verify a document (satisfaction) that had been signed by a 'robosigner' a month earlier. I called the contact place on the document and from what I gleaned, it was much like Debtpie described. The "VP of JP Chase" was a shift worker who had a cubicle, no phone, and was not allowed to take phone calls. I could only speak to her supervisor, who was reluctant to tell me who she worked for. With effort, finally she would only say "Chase", nothing more. It took me two transfers to reach the extension, a couple call backs because nobody at the main number on the documnt had heard of the employee or department, until I finally reached a receptionist who agreed to investigate for me. The supervisor was unwilling to provide me with a direct contact number. She told me it was prohibited by policy. The woman who answered the phone and transferred me to the supervisor answered by saying "Hey". This was before the multi-state AG agreement but well after the OCC consent orders. Nothing has changed though. There was no evidence that Chase owned the mortgage. The supervisor claimed they had a signing agreement with the entity (Ohio Savings -> AmTrust) that had owned the mortgage and had since become insolvent. JP Chase took over the accounts. I don't believe signing agreements are valid with bankrupt/resolved entities, FDIC orders are required, but I'm not an attorney, so I don't completely understand all the nuances.

This is the kind of entity that is manufacturing mortgage documents today. The mortgage world of today is not the same one that it was 10 years ago. They use outdated software and are understaffed and overworked, and completely ill equipped to handle the high volume of foreclosures they are inundated with. Between the inability to process and file the volume of foreclosures and the high numbers of REO held, lenders are where you will find the bottleneck to the foreclosure pipeline.