For going on three years now I’ve watched the State of California more so than any other engage in a debate over loan modifications and lawyers, the key questions being: do you need one, should you have one, are lawyers scamming homeowners, and most notably, since California’s Senate Bill  94 (“SB 94”) became law in October of 2009, when can a lawyer be paid when providing loan modification services.

Throughout this “debate,” the Better Business Bureau has played a role by rating law firms offering loan modification services.  If the BBB says that someone is ‘A’ rated then presumably consumers are more likely to turn to that firm for assistance, and obviously, being rated ‘F’ tends to have the opposite effect.

Well, recently a law firm with which I’ve become very familiar over the last three years, CDA Law in Orange County, California, was rated ‘F’ by the BBB, and predictably, within a couple of weeks the firm started losing clients because of the rating.

Before I explain the background for what’s going on here, I want to be clear about a few things:

1. I have no financial interest in CDA Law, nor am I being paid to write this.
2. I’m sure that I’ve referred at least 200 hundred homeowners to CDA Law over the last few years, I don’t keep track of the number, but it’s in that range without question, and all I have to show for it are thank you notes.
3. CDA Law does not deserve to be rated ‘F’ by the BBB.  The BBB’s ‘F’ rating is based on a politically motivated intentional misstatement of the law by certain individuals.
4. This past year I personally audited 400 randomly selected 2011 client files at CDA Law, so I know how they perform first hand.  Over almost four years, firm records show it obtained permanent loan modifications for more than 3,000 California homeowners.

I also want to be clear that I am not writing this to tell homeowners that in all cases they should retain CDA Law.  Every homeowner’s situation, facts and goals are different, and the decision as to which law firm one should or shouldn’t engage depends on the specifics involved.

What I am here to do is state unequivocally to homeowners that it is my considered opinion that the decision not to retain CDA Law should not be based on the firm’s BBB’s rating, because that rating is baseless and entirely inappropriate.

The fact is that upon learning of the BBB’s ‘F’ rating of CDA Law, I offered to write this because I’m all but certain that some number of homeowners who decide to avoid CDA Law because of its BBB rating will end up getting scammed and homes will be lost to foreclosure as a result.

And, at this point in the foreclosure crisis, the fact that I can say that about the chances of a homeowner getting ripped off by a scammer, or wrongfully made homeless by a servicer, is both an unthinkable tragedy and a shameful testament to the failure of our state and federal regulators to protect homeowners from predatory servicers and unscrupulous operators of various foreclosure avoidance schemes.

Okay, so why is CDA Law rated ‘F’ by the BBB?

To understand where we stand today in California as related to lawyers and loan modifications, you have to understand a few things about how it all started back in 2009, when we went through a phase where we were told by banks, government agencies and the mainstream media that everyone involved in loan modifications was a “scammer.”

According to a knowledgeable insider who worked at the California State Bar Association at the time, the State Bar had no history of lawyers committing acts of misconduct related to loan modifications until the very end of 2008 when complaints started to trickle in, and then in 2009, inundate the Bar with 800-900 a month.  No one knew what was going on back then.  I’m sure just seeing the raw numbers of complaints was shocking, never mind what was being said.

California is the only state with a State Bar that is both a trade association and regulatory agency.  Technically, the Bar reports to the state’s Supreme Court, but at the same time the Governor can prevent the Bar from collecting its dues, and as a result the state legislature is known to put pressure on the Bar as well.

Most often, over the last 25 years, that pressure has come in the form of criticism that the Bar is not vigilant enough when it comes to prosecuting lawyers for misconduct.

By Spring of 2009, a joint task force was being set up to go after these “scammers” who were taking advantage of distressed homeowners.  Included would be the Office of the Attorney General, the state’s Department of Real Estate, the FTC… and of course, the State Bar.

Then State Bar president Howard Miller saw the task force as an opportunity to show politicians in Sacramento that the Bar was ready to get tough on crime, on behalf of the defenseless victims of the foreclosure crisis.

So, during summer of that year, Howard Miller, made the following statement to the press…

“At least hundreds and perhaps thousands of California lawyers who have been victimizing those who are already victims at the most vulnerable point in their lives… every one of those lawyers will be subject to discipline and some will go to jail.”

How many of the scammers were lawyers?  No one had any idea, in fact the State Bar hadn’t even had time to read the vast majority of the complaints, but there was no question that there were many charging up-front fees and claiming to be able to get loans modified, and with increasing and alarming frequency, they were definitely ripping off homeowners.

Back then, I think every major bank played messages to those waiting on hold that said: “You don’t need a lawyer, call (insert bank name) for assistance with a loan modification.”  And both the state and federal government’s positions were almost identical: “You don’t need a lawyer, call your bank or a HUD counselor for assistance with a loan modification.”

To anyone watching, one thing was very clear: Neither the banks nor our government wanted homeowners to retain lawyers to help them save their homes from foreclosure.

That the banks took this position wasn’t surprising.  Obviously, it would be easier to deal with a homeowner than a homeowner’s attorney.  And attorneys in the mix would mean the threat of litigation, which would be both costly and time consuming for banks to defend.  And as to why, in 2009, those in our government also assumed an anti-lawyer stance related to lawyers and loan modifications, to me the answer was the obvious one… they went along with the banks.

Miller’s statement always seemed to be a preposterous one to me, and I wrote about it at the time, saying that I found it impossible to accept that there were “hundreds if not thousands” of lawyers scamming homeowners in California or anywhere else for that matter.

Were there some?  Of course there were some.

California is a state of enormous size; over 37 million residents, roughly 7 million homeowners and more than 235,000 licensed attorneys, according to the California State Bar Association.  There are “some” of just about anything you can think of here.  I’d bet money that in California today there are “some” wearing tin foil so that the space ships can’t see them.  But were there ever “hundreds if not thousands” of lawyers scamming homeowners having to do with loan modifications?  Not a chance.

By 2010 it was becoming increasingly obvious that that what the Bar’s president had told the press about “hundreds if not thousands of lawyers” scamming homeowners was in fact false.

Just consider that as of May 12, 2012, and this is according to the State Bar Press Office, since February of 2009, more than three years after Mr. Miller voiced those inflammatory allegations:

• Since 2009, only 18 attorneys in California have been disbarred related to providing loan modification services. 

• The State Bar has “pursued disciplinary charges related to loan modification services involving about 153 attorneys.”

• Of those, only 69 have been disciplined in some way, which includes anything from being required to attend an ethics class to a temporary suspension.

• None have gone to jail. 

In California, a state with over 235,000 licensed attorneys, the disbarment of 18 lawyers is hardly to be considered pandemic.  And it’s a far cry from Miller’s “hundreds if not thousands,” to be sure.

There simply never were hundreds much less thousands of lawyers scamming homeowners in California.

The Banking Committees Get in On the Act…

Other politicians were fast to get in on the consumer protection act as well.

Senator Ron Calderon and Assembly Representative Pedro Nava, each the chairs of their respective banking committees, were both quick to sponsor bills claiming to protect homeowners from the proliferation of loan modification scammers.

Ex-Mortgage Banker, Sen. Ron S. Calderon

Chaired Senate Banking Committee, Sponsor of SB 94 

Senator Calderon’s bill, known as SB 94, was the one signed into law on October 12, 2009, with the Mortgage Bankers Association, the California State Bar Association and the California Department of Real Estate all listed among the supporters of the bill.

SB 94 was written to apply to both lawyers and Department of Real Estate (“DRE”) licensees.  The language pertaining to lawyers is found in the California Civil Code, and the language pertaining to DRE licensees is in the California Business & Professions Code.

The scams, in all cases, involved homeowners being required to pay an up-front or advance fee, so SB 94 focused on making it illegal to charge an advance fee related to providing loan modification services.  So, whether we’re talking about a licensed attorney or DRE licensee, the operative language is identical.  Neither is permitted to…

“…claim, demand, charge, collect, or receive any compensation until after the person has fully performed each and every service the person contracted to perform or represented that he or she would perform.” 

But, as it pertained to DRE licensees, however, SB 94 went a step further by modifying language contained in Business & Professions (“B&P”) Code Section 10026 to prevent DRE licensees from breaking up loan modification services or fees into component parts as shown below in bold:

DIVISION 4.  REAL ESTATE

    PART 1.  LICENSING OF PERSONS

     CHAPTER 1.  GENERAL PROVISIONS …………………………. 10000-10035

10026.  (a) The term “advance fee,” as used in this part, is a fee, regardless of the form, that is claimed, demanded, charged, received, or collected by a licensee for services requiring a license, or for a listing, as that term is defined in Section 10027, before fully completing the service the licensee contracted to perform or represented would be performed. Neither an advance fee nor the services to be performed shall be separated or divided into components for the purpose of avoiding the application of this division.

As a result, a DRE licensee can only view a loan modification as a single service, and therefore only be paid after that one service has been provided, which would be when the homeowner is either approved or denied for a loan modification… the very end of the process.

However, there is no language in SB 94 that prohibits lawyers from breaking up loan modification services and/or fees into parts, as there is for DRE licensees.

Therefore, while SB 94 precludes lawyers from charging advance fees, the law does allow lawyers providing loan modification services to be paid for a specific set of contracted services upon their completion, regardless of whether at the beginning, middle or end of the loan modification process.

The legal profession refers to this as the “unbundling” of services.

Even though literally hundreds of lawyers from all over California contacted the State Bar to ask about the unbundling of services into separate contractual agreements under SB 94, with compensation being received at the end of each contract, for more than two years, the State Bar remained quiet on the subject.

Of course, it didn’t much matter what the banks or government entities had said in early 2009, many homeowners discovered very quickly that calling their bank directly, or a HUD counselor, did not result in their loans being modified… and on top of that, it was a maddening and even torturous experience.  It was becoming clearer every day that having a lawyer to help get your loan modified wasn’t such a bad idea.

It seemed that the storm had passed.

Enter: The Better Business Bureau

In 2010, the BBB reacted to the rhetoric by giving an ‘F’ rating to just about everyone providing loan modification services in California.

Frankly, I always found that policy to be disadvantageous to homeowners because it forced consumers to choose a firm from a basket of ‘Fs,’ and since clearly some deserved the low rating and others didn’t, I reasoned that such a policy actually increased the potential for consumers to make a bad choice.

Having successfully completed more than 3,000 loan modifications for California homeowners over the last four years, not only is CDA Law not a scammer, but they’d certainly appear at or near the top of anyone’s list of most effective firms modifying loans.

Eventually, the BBB apparently agreed, awarding CDA Law an ‘A-‘ rating for a period of time.

And, yes… I am the authority on this issue. 

I want the reader to know that what I’m saying is not based on a cursory review of the subject matter.  My qualifications to make the statements I’m making about loan modifications and the foreclosure crisis in California at the very least equal anyone else’s.  Although it was never my intention that this be the case, on the subject of the foreclosure crisis, I’ve become a leading expert, and I can’t imagine anyone contesting that claim.

In point of fact, this past year I was accepted as an “expert witness” by the California State Bar Court and I provided expert testimony on loan modifications and the foreclosure crisis in an administrative hearing on behalf of an attorney in that court.

I started writing about the foreclosure crisis in 2008.  Since then I’ve written close to 700 articles on the political, economic, social and legal aspects of the financial and foreclosure crises.  To do that, as you might imagine, I’ve read essentially all of the most widely known articles, reports, or studies that have been published nationwide.

Last year, when I stopped counting, I’d received more than 30,000 emails from homeowners all over the country.  I’ve personally interviewed close to 4,000 homeowners at risk of foreclosure along with hundreds of attorneys involved in representing such homeowners.

In 2010, I also conducted a qualitative study of homeowner complaints, which included reading 1200 letters written by homeowners who had either hired a lawyer, a mortgage broker, or no one at all to help them with their loan modification.

I was an invited speaker on the subject of loan modifications at the American Bar Association’s Conference on Consumer Financial Services, appearing on a panel with Thomas Pahl, an Assistant Director in the FTC’s Division of Financial Practices, and I was invited to speak on the crisis again, from the homeowner’s perspective, at the 9^th Circuit Judicial Conference in front of a few hundred federal court judges.

Additionally, I’ve been invited to speak at numerous homeowner meetings, and at a luncheon held by the Orange County Bar Association, for whom I also taught a CLE class for attorneys on loan modifications, alongside a compliance and mortgage banking attorney, and an ethics and bar defense attorney.

And I have not let up for what is now going on four years.  I continue to write my blog, Mandelman Matters, which is among the most widely read on the subject, and I continue to make my email and phone number available online, which means I get hundreds of calls and emails each month from homeowners at risk of foreclosure, and attorneys involved in foreclosure defense in almost all 50 states.

Lastly, I have no dog in this race, as they say.  I’ve never been in the mortgage or real estate industries, never been paid a nickel by a homeowner, nor for referring anyone anywhere.  I’m not personally at risk of foreclosure… today, anyway… and I have no direct financial incentive to say anything specific about the crisis or about CDA Law.

Now back to the BBB…

This past fall, members of the state legislature told the State Bar that they needed to clean up the back log of disciplinary cases, and once again, politics appears to have played a role in the Bar’s use of inflammatory rhetoric and behavior.

Suzan Anderson, Supervisor of the State Bar’s Special Team on Loan Modification Fraud, while speaking at the State Bar’s Annual Meeting last September, announced that the Bar would now be taking the position that lawyers helping clients with loan modifications would not be permitted to unbundle services related to loan modifications.

Ms. Anderson said that it was now the position of the California State Bar that lawyers working on obtaining loan modifications on behalf of their clients could not be paid until the end of the loan modification process, even though no such language is found in the statute. Not only that, but a disclaimer at the bottom of her presentation’s front page stated that this was not the official position of the State Bar, so once again the Bar wasn’t willing to make it a policy.

Following the State Bar’s annual meeting, prosecutors at the Bar began using the threat of SB 94 to get attorneys who were offering loan modification services to accept some sort of disciplinary action for unbundling their services.  These attorneys were only accepting payment for services upon the completion of contracted services, and they therefore were complying with both the language contained in SB 94 and the bill’s legislative intent, according to its drafter.  None that I knew personally ever charged advance fees.

The State Bar has provided no basis for their new opinion, nor have they allowed the issue to be argued in front of a judge.  Maybe the basis is their misreading of the statute.  Maybe it’s because the banking lobby has pressured the state legislature to do everything possible to stop homeowners from hiring lawyers to help them get their loans modified.

Or, maybe it’s just a feeling they have… I really don’t care.  The Bar’s made up of lawyers and they’ve had almost three years to figure it out, so unless they’re remedial readers, I’m done giving them a free pass.

Never mind for a moment what the law says, the fact is that lawyers could not offer to help homeowners with loan modifications if they couldn’t be paid until the end of the process, and the reason should be very easy to understand.

Homeowners applying for a loan modification… by definition… are experiencing a significant financial hardship and as a result, many end up filing bankruptcy at some point in the process.

That means if a lawyer were not paid along the way as services were completed, then he or she would often work for six months or a year to get a loan modified… and then, upon advising the client to file bankruptcy… have his or her bill for services placed into the bankruptcy as unsecured debt to be discharged.  The lawyer would never be able to receive payment for what could easily be months of time spent working on getting the loan modified.

It’s an unresolvable conflict.  Work all year.  Advise your client to file bankruptcy.  And then tear up your bill for your year’s work on the loan modification.  Do you know anyone that could or would work under such a condition?

The State Bar, if asked, says that they’re not trying to prevent homeowners at risk of foreclosure from being able to hire lawyers to help them get their loans modified.  But, that statement strains credulity when their so-called interpretation sets up the type of conflict as is found with SB 94.

What the State Bar started doing last fall is clearly politically motivated and very wrong.  And at this point, the issue is going to have to be settled by the courts as there is already one lawsuit filed by an attorney against the State Bar over their interpretation of SB 94, and most assuredly others are going to be filed very soon.

By the way, it’s interesting because as I mentioned, outside of threatening lawyers with charges of unbundling services under SB 94, the Bar has never actually brought such charges into court.  Instead, the State Bar only threatens attorneys with violations of SB 94, but then offers the lawyers some sort of deal to avoid have charges filed, and in all cases to-date the lawyers have taken the deal rather than take on the risk and expense of fighting the State Bar in court.

Once the lawyer accepts the discipline deal offered by the Bar, his name goes onto the Bar’s regulatory scorecard that they can then show to whichever members of the state legislature are interested, as proof that they are cleaning up their backlog of cases and being tough on the lawyers they regulate.

But, let’s be honest about this… we know which members of the state legislature we’re talking about here, right?  Why, the members of the senate and/or assembly banking committees, of course.  Do I know that to be a fact?  No.  But, if anyone is feeling lucky, let me know and I’d be happy to see if we can’t arrange a little wager.  Who else do you think it could be… telecommunications?  Agriculture?  Please…

It’s really quite scandalous.

The California State Bar has been getting away with using attorneys that offer to help homeowners obtain loan modifications as their political piñata for far too long.  It’s an example of a state agency abusing its power for political purposes and it must be stopped before its behavior causes any further harm to California homeowners.

Three years after SB 94 was signed into law, and its become abundantly clear that Miller’s statements were made for political purposes, without any regard for the truth or consideration of the harm such statements could cause.

Miller was all too aware that the State Bar was under attack by some in the state legislature for not aggressively disciplining lawyers, and he saw what was going on related to loan modifications and the foreclosure crisis as a way to look like a tough regulator of the legal profession.

The BBB Strikes Again…

One of the ways the Bar has endeavored to made life difficult for lawyers offering to help homeowners obtain loan modifications is by telling the BBB about what I would call their incorrect and baseless interpretation of SB 94.

And if you’re a lawyer helping homeowners with loan modifications, it’s not at all unusual to wake up one morning to find your firm has been rated ‘F’ by the BBB.

Why?  Because you’re unbundling loan modification services, of course.  Contracting to perform services A, B, C & D… and not being paid until those services have been completed to your client’s satisfaction.  Just like the language in SB 94 says you can do.

And just so everyone knows… I’m far from alone in this view.  Most or all State Bar Defense and Ethics attorneys in California share my view, as do numerous legal scholars and literally hundreds of other licensed practicing California attorneys.

We’ve learned a lot since 2009, or at least we should have…

In 2009, when President Obama announced his Making Home Affordable plan, most people in this country believed it would work.  Obama was the smart president… the man of the people.

It hasn’t worked though, at least nowhere near as he said it would, and we’ve also learned that he is as Wall Street friendly as they come… at least that’s how he behaved during his first term.

During the summer of 2009, when someone’s loan didn’t get modified, a lot of lawyers and others got the blame… many were even wrongly branded “scammers” as a result.  But, today we should all know what was actually going on, right?  It was the servicers that were at best giving homeowners the run-around and failing to modify loans as required under the president’s program.

And as State Bar Deputy Trial Counsel Victoria Molloy said back in 2010…

“If an attorney is hired to assist in a loan modification, and they make good faith efforts, whether they’re successful or not, presumably they’ve earned their fees.”

We know that today, but we didn’t know it then.  There were never “hundreds if not thousands” of lawyers scamming homeowners, that number was closer to 18.  The damage, however, was done, and many California homeowners who chose to go it alone lost their homes as a result.

Without question, that erroneous statement made by the Bar’s president continues to cause significant harm to the legal profession and to the numerous licensed and ethical attorneys in California who want to help, or do offer to help homeowners get their loans restructured.

Beyond those egregious outcomes, the State Bar’s lie has also caused irrevocable harm to California homeowners who have either not been able to find lawyers to represent them when seeking loan modifications, or have been too scared of being scammed by the fictitious thousands of illicit lawyers to try.

California has roughly two million homeowners either already in foreclosure or seriously delinquent, far more than any other state.  Whether the media wants to admit it or not, our state is literally drowning as a result of foreclosures, with our state’s budget deficit now at $16 billion and potentially rising.

And there should be no question, in light of the recent National Mortgage Settlement, among many other factors, that mortgage servicers are quite capable of abusing the rights of homeowners seeking to modify loans.

With all of that being the case, it would seem obvious that what the State Bar continues to do to prevent the legal profession in California from helping homeowners modify their loans is unconscionable and must be stopped.

The BBB is just acting as a witless and willing accomplice in this plot to deprive homeowners of lawyers should they find themselves at risk of foreclosure.  They’re certainly not protecting anyone by rating CDA Law ‘F.’  In fact, they’re only harming homeowners by doing that.

Over a four-year timeframe, and having helped over 3,000 homeowner get their loans modified, CDA Law has had only 15 total complaints with the BBB, as follows: 2009… 2, 2010… 7, 2011… 5 2012… just 1.  It’s not an easy business, dealing with servicers and homeowners at risk of foreclosure.  Not everyone will be happy.

But, in CDA’s case, complaints are under one-half of one percent, and every one has been answered… some of the complaints were made by homeowners who got their loans modified with CDA Law’s help, but they didn’t like the terms offered by their servicer.

At the same time, if you do visit the BBB’s website, be sure to check out the TrustLink positive comments made by 243 of CDA’s very satisfied clients who are still in their homes because of the work done by the attorneys and support staff at CDA Law.

And, by the way… SB 94 has not stopped scammers in California… they are as plentiful as they ever were.  Throw a dart at Google’s front page after searching for loan modification or anything close and I can all but assure you of getting robbed.

And the State Bar knows what I’m saying is true, because at the end of 2010, Suzan Anderson, Supervisor of the State Bar’s Special Team on Loan Modification Fraud, speaking last December to David Streitfeld of The New York Times about SB 94 said the following: “I wish the law had worked.”

Yeah, well don’t we all.

I look forward to the day when this area of the law can no longer be muddied by mortgage banking industry lobbyists and the politically motivated opinions of members of banking committees.

California is the only state having this debate, by the way.  The other 49 states figured things out ages ago, if they ever had the debate in the first place, and the FTC’s MARS rule, which allows lawyers to accept retainers into their trust account, receiving amounts as earned.

Soon enough, the courts will rule.  I have no doubt that California’s courts will uphold the rule of law, and not succumb to the wishes of the banking elite.

Banks have lawyers that help them, and should I ever find myself at risk of losing my own home to foreclosure, I want to be able to hire a lawyer to sit on my side of the table as well.  I don’t need the State Bar or the state legislature “protecting” me from scammers, imaginary or otherwise, if by doing so they are going to take away my absolute right to legal council.

Feel free to email me with questions or comments at mandelman@mac.com.

Martin Andelman

Mandelman Matters

You have found the Mandelman Matters state specific series of pages dedicated to homeowners at risk of foreclosure in Arizona.

On the pages in this section you’ll find accurate, straightforward information and guidance specific to the State of Arizona related to such topics as loan modifications, short sales, foreclosure defense litigation, bankruptcy… and other topics related to getting through the foreclosure crisis.

We’ve created these Arizona specific pages in response to the proliferation of scammers polluting the Internet with misinformation and outright lies intended to sell something to homeowners at risk of foreclosure that they don’t need.  These sites are literally everywhere, and some are very good at appearing credible, when in fact they are nothing more than elaborate cons.

Well, we’ve taken great care to make sure that the information you’ll find here is always correct… always impartial… always based on real facts… and always easy to understand.

In case you’re not already familiar with me, my name is Martin Andelman and for going on four years, I’ve been writing the widely read blog Mandelman Matters.  Over the last three and a half years, I’ve written more than 650 in-depth articles covering the political, economic, social and legal aspects of the financial and foreclosure crises.

I decided that I had to do more to help stop homeowners from getting ripped off, by providing the state specific information homeowners need to make the right decisions for their individual goals and circumstances.  Moving forward on the best possible path… that’s what my state specific pages are all about.

And just so you know, I’ve never been in the mortgage business or the real estate business, but for more than twenty years I’ve been a writer that specializes in making complex subjects easy for people to understand… oh yeah, and people say I’m funny.  I have in-depth experience writing about subjects that fall under the broad headings of accounting, insurance, financial services and law.

You can read a lot more about me HERE, HERE, and HERE.

You may want to start by getting to know my trusted attornies for the State of Arizona, Michael Fleishman and Donald Lawrence.

No one pays to be listed as a trusted attorney on Mandelman Matters… that’s just not how it works.  The lawyers I list as trusted… are simply those I trust.  And when I say that, I mean that I would trust these people to represent me, or to watch my house while I went away on vacation for the summer.

In order to write close to 700 articles on the economic situation we’re facing today, I had to learn everything possible about the mortgage and foreclosure crises.  Not only did I read dozens of books, research reports, court decisions, and more… I also had to interview a lot of people and many were attorneys from all over the country.  Over time, some became good friends.  So, when homeowners would call me to ask if I could recommend a lawyer, I would refer them to one that I had gotten to know well, and trusted.

As Mandelman Matters trusted attornies, Michael Fleishman and Donald Lawrence have agreed to take calls from Arizona homeowners who have questions about foreclosures, and help them by providing answers regardless of whether the caller decides to hire their firm or not.  So, if you want to talk with someone who knows foreclosure in Arizona, please don’t hesitate to call them.

For Fleishman Law’s contact information, CLICK HERE.

For Donald Lawrences’ contact information, CLICK HERE.

And, if you’re looking for State Resources, CLICK HERE.

Need to know more about Arizona Foreclosure Laws, CLICK HERE.

Want to read my latest post about Arizona on Mandelman Matters? CLICK HERE.

You have found the Mandelman Matters state specific series of pages dedicated to homeowners at risk of foreclosure in Florida.

On the pages in this section you’ll find accurate, straightforward information and guidance specific to the State of Florida related to such topics as loan modifications, short sales, foreclosure defense litigation, bankruptcy… and other topics related to getting through the foreclosure crisis.

We’ve created these Florida specific pages in response to the proliferation of scammers polluting the Internet with misinformation and outright lies intended to sell something to homeowners at risk of foreclosure that they don’t need.  These sites are literally everywhere, and some are very good at appearing credible, when in fact they are nothing more than elaborate cons.

Well, we’ve taken great care to make sure that the information you’ll find here is always correct… always impartial… always based on real facts… and always easy to understand.

In case you’re not already familiar with me, my name is Martin Andelman and for going on four years, I’ve been writing the widely read blog Mandelman Matters.  Over the last three and a half years, I’ve written more than 650 in-depth articles covering the political, economic, social and legal aspects of the financial and foreclosure crises.

I decided that I had to do more to help stop homeowners from getting ripped off, by providing the state specific information homeowners need to make the right decisions for their individual goals and circumstances.  Moving forward on the best possible path… that’s what my state specific pages are all about.

And just so you know, I’ve never been in the mortgage business or the real estate business, but for more than twenty years I’ve been a writer that specializes in making complex subjects easy for people to understand… oh yeah, and people say I’m funny.  I have in-depth experience writing about subjects that fall under the broad headings of accounting, insurance, financial services and law.

You can read a lot more about me HERE, HERE, and HERE.

You may want to start by getting to know my trusted attorney for the State of Florida, Cox & Sanchez.

No one pays to be listed as a trusted attorney on Mandelman Matters… that’s just not how it works.  The lawyers I list as trusted… are simply those I trust.  And when I say that, I mean that I would trust these people to represent me, or to watch my house while I went away on vacation for the summer.

In order to write close to 700 articles on the economic situation we’re facing today, I had to learn everything possible about the mortgage and foreclosure crises.  Not only did I read dozens of books, research reports, court decisions, and more… I also had to interview a lot of people and many were attorneys from all over the country.  Over time, some became good friends.  So, when homeowners would call me to ask if I could recommend a lawyer, I would refer them to one that I had gotten to know well, and trusted.

As a Mandelman Matters trusted attorney, Cox & Sanchez has agreed to take calls from Florida homeowners who have questions about foreclosures, and help them by providing answers regardless of whether the caller decides to hire their firm or not.  So, if you want to talk with someone who knows foreclosure in Florida, please don’t hesitate to call them.

For Cox & Sanchez’s contact information, CLICK HERE.

And, if you’re looking for State Resources, CLICK HERE.

Need to know more about Florida Foreclosure Laws, CLICK HERE.

Want to read my latest post about Florida on Mandelman Matters? CLICK HERE.

]]> http://mandelman.ml-implode.com/2012/05/florida-foreclosure-help-from-mandelman-matters-start-here/feed/ 0 http://mandelman.ml-implode.com/2012/05/wells-fargo-gives-22000-to-suicide-hotline-a-gift-the-bank-can-use-too/ http://mandelman.ml-implode.com/2012/05/wells-fargo-gives-22000-to-suicide-hotline-a-gift-the-bank-can-use-too/#comments Wed, 16 May 2012 18:01:07 +0000 Mandelman http://mandelman.ml-implode.com/?p=10254

It all started when I saw that this past February, Wells Fargo had donated $22,000 to establish a suicide prevention hotline in Idaho, apparently the state with the fourth highest suicide rate in the nation.  I find that statistic a little odd, but what do I know.  I’ve never even been to Idaho.

The United Way for Treasure Valley phrased it as follows on their website:

Wells Fargo stepped up Tuesday with a $22,000 gift to help establish an Idaho Suicide Prevention hotline.

“Wells Fargo is pleased to invest in this important community initiative to address a critical need in our state,” said Dana Reddington, Idaho Region president for the banking firm.

Wells Fargo “stepped up” with a $22,000 “gift.”  Is that how that should ideally be phrased?  I suppose it’s fine.  But, having spent the last few days writing and talking about Norm Rousseau, who took his own life this past Sunday after a protracted battle with… no, not cancer… much worse.  You know, we can in many cases cure certain kinds of cancer.

Norm’s protracted battle was with Wells Fargo, and no one has even come close to finding a cure for them.  So, on Sunday morning, just a few days ago, he lost the will to continue the fight after staying up all night trying in vain to fix the engine in a motorhome he was hoping to house his family in after being evicted on yesterday morning.

Look, I only spoke with Norm once for about an hour, so I shouldn’t really speak for him, but I just wanted to say that I’m pretty sure that he would have gladly traded his battle with Wells for… maybe not pancreatic, but let’s say prostate cancer… for sure.  I think so, anyway.

In fact, I’d probably make the same trade at this point were I given the choice.  I’m thinking that the cure rate for prostate cancer for a male in his 50s is much higher than the cure rate for a battle with Wells Fargo these days.  I don’t know… maybe I’m nuts… it’s not my core point here, so just forget it.

Anyway, I understand Wells Fargo wanting to give a gift that establishes a suicide hotline… it’s a gift the bank can use too.  And I do understand giving that sort of gift.

I’ve been married for 22 years, and although I hate to admit what I’m about to say, I’m hoping some of you guys have done it as well.  Maybe not the women, I really don’t know.

So, I was thinking about my birthday, it being only a few weeks away, and what I wanted to ask for in the way of a gift.

When my wife and I first got married, I always bought her birthday presents that were clearly hers alone… jewelry, clothes, I don’t know… a new tennis racquet, a mountain bike, golf clubs… those sorts of things.  Nothing that I had anything to do with as far as usage went.

But the longer we’ve been married, I’ve noticed that I’ve started drifting towards gifts that aren’t really just hers, but sort of ours… kind of.  I’m not entirely certain, but it’s possible that one year for her birthday I may have bought her our new breakfast nook table and chairs set.  That wasn’t cool, I thought to myself.

I shouldn’t be doing that sort of thing, right?  That’s not the way you stay happily married, or even breathing and walking upright, depending on your spouse’s comfort level with firearms.

It occurred to me that I might just be turning into my father, perish the thought… and that could not be considered anything short of terrifying.    Turn on the sirens people… crash positions… we’re going in hot and hard.

Truth be told, I couldn’t even remember what I had bought her last year for her birthday, and that was not giving me a very reassuring feeling.  Maybe since we need a new air conditioning unit for the house, maybe that’s what I should want for my birthday this year.

When I was really a young boy, maybe six or seven years old, I remember my father asking me if I wanted to go with him to Sears one evening after dinner.

I jumped at the opportunity of course, after all, a trip to Sears meant two things: A chance to sit on and pretend to drive several different riding lawnmowers… and a bag of hot cashews from the stand that sat in the middle of the store on the bottom level.  Good times.

So, we get to Sears, my father and me, and I head straight for the riding lawnmowers.  Remember that part of Forrest Gump when even though he’s already a zillionaire, he goes back home and the City Fathers give him “a fine job,” and he’s riding a lawnmower around this field cutting the grass?  Yeah, well I understood that part of the movie.  I completely agreed… Forrest looked like he did have a fine job there.

So, anyway… after a few minutes when my father had run out of patience with the lawnmower engine sounds I was making with my mouth, he said let’s go and we headed on into the store.  The smell of hot cashews used to hit you right as you walked in the door of the Sears where I grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and both my father and I were huge fans of the toasty warm aromatic nuts.

So, we got us a small bag before heading off for the guaranteed-to-be-boring part of the excursion, at least as far as I was concerned.  The part when we’d have to actually shop for whatever it was he wanted to find… the reason we were there, you might say.

He explained that we had come to buy my Mom a birthday present, which was the next day.

“Let’s get her a board game, Dad,” was the first thing that came to my young mind.  Well, why not… it was something I understood and knew I could get some utility from… and heck, she’d probably have liked it quite a bit too, especially if there was spelling involved.  Mom loved to spell anything anytime, and she was darn good at it too.

But, Dad said no. He had something else in mind, as we headed on over to the dreaded, “Housewares” department.

Housewares was the section that had the most things I didn’t understand, and I braced myself and took a deep breath, just as I might have done were I about to be placed into solitary confinement while doing time on Alcatraz.

We got there and I did a 360 to take in my surroundings.  Sure enough, I was absolutely surrounded by “Housewares,” and an old man who could have played Santa Claus at Christmas if you spotted him a fake beard and some hair, waddled over to offer his assistance to my father while doing a quick comb through of his thinning hair, completely ignoring me, of course.

This was the 1960s, and I was still to be seen, but not heard in many circles.  Unlike today, when we let our 8 year olds pick out the family car.

I heard my father say something about a chair of some kind… but after that it was pretty much just a blur.  For a boy my age during The Wonder Years of the 1960s it was genetically impossible to stay attentive during conversations of such banality.

Soon they had focused in on a particular chair.  It was metal with yellow vinyl, sort of a highchair with steps that slid out from underneath, a feature my father was saying would be highly valued by Mom, who was only 5’3” and apparently couldn’t reach certain things without a step ladder.  I hadn’t known about her shortcomings before that day, as she was plenty tall to reach everything I needed her to reach.

So, it was probably only a few minutes later, although it seemed a good hour or two, and we were paying with Dad’s Sears charge card, and then heading back to our station wagon, a 1963 Plymouth, dressed in a sickly hospital green color that my father said he liked, although I didn’t see how that could be possible.

We pulled around and there was that aging rotund and balding salesman, waddling towards us and carrying a decent size box, inside which, I assumed, would be the chair even though the box didn’t seem large enough to hold the chair.  As he was loading the box into the wagon, the man told my father that there would be, “some assembly required,” to which my father replied, “Sure.”  Dad actually seemed happy to hear of it.

My Dad owned a small grey metal Craftsman toolbox that he kept in the front hall closet that was strictly off limits as far as I was concerned.  He’d pull it out any time those words were spoken, “some assembly required,” or whenever there was some sort of disaster in our hundred year-old home.

Dad faced each job with an air of confidence that said clearly that he was unquestionably capable of handling any job that was thrown his way and he would do so with whatever was in his small grey metal toolbox.  It was a toolbox akin to Mary Poppins’ carpetbag, if you remember the movie with Julie Andrews and Dick Van Dyke.  It was as if he was expecting to be able to reach in and pull out a belt sander and a table saw.

The problem invariably was that whatever he needed he didn’t have and whatever he thought he could do, he really couldn’t, at least not in the time he had thought that he could.  And if hung around too long or stood too close, he’d end up blaming me for whatever wasn’t in his toolbox, growing more frustrated by the minute until he got the job done, which sometimes required a two or three day affair.

After the first couple of hours, there was no talking to him, and when the project had finally been completed he’d sit in front of the fireplace or television and sip what I later learned was Jack Daniels, but what he used to call Dry Sherry.

My father was, after all, a Harvard man.  And you can tell a Harvard man… but you can’t tell him much.

So, being a child of above average intelligence, as soon as we walked in our front door, I shot upstairs to my room, claiming homework or a bath was calling, the sort of tasks that I knew would trump helping Dad assemble the chair, or anything else he had in mind… so he went to work in the basement assembling Mom’s birthday surprise.

Yes, my brilliant, PhD, Harvard, college professor father had just thrown down maybe $19 on a metal stepstool/chair in yellow vinyl from Sears.  And he was so proud the next evening when, finally assembled after maybe six or seven hours of hard work, he presented it to her after we had finished dinner.

Mom had made cupcakes, as she was prone to do, and she started to light a match in order to light the little candles, one in each cupcake, except for the one that was for my little sister, Karen, who wasn’t even 2 years old at the time, and to my way of thinking, clearly didn’t qualify as any sort of human member of our family.  Certainly not one who needed a cupcake.

Mom struck the match but it failed to light and that was all the chances Mom got on things like lighting matches.  Dad reached out and took them into his much more capable hands.  He struck the match… nothing.  Mom smiled and looked away, you could tell she couldn’t have been more pleased at that moment.

Next match was the pressure match and lucky for Dad it was a winner and the candles were soon aglow as we sang…

Happy birthday to you… Happy birthday to you… Happy birthday dear Barbara/Mommy… Happy birthday to you!

I grunted as Mom gave Karen her own cupcake, sans candle.  “She can’t eat that, she doesn’t even know what it is,” I said with the sort of superiority only a six year-old older brother can muster.

“She can lick it,” Mom said smiling at the useless drooling infant that had Zwieback toast crumbs all over her face and in her hair.

I looked at the thing they called my sister thinking, “Later, when no one is looking, I’ll drag you down the stairs head first, you little parasite,” or at least the six year-old version of that sentence.

Karen grabbed the cupcake, squished it a little, mashed it icing side down onto her highchair… and promptly threw it straight onto the floor.  Yeah, she was small and didn’t say much, but I knew she had done that just to torture me.

“Maaaaaam,” I yelled out as I jumped for the cupcake, hoping against hope that my mother would at that moment take leave of her senses and allow me to eat it off the floor.  No such luck.

“Hand it to me,” she said in that voice.  And I did… resistance I knew, was futile.

So, with the festivities now over, we went into the kitchen to examine the gift and there it was… that glorious yellow vinyl and metal, half highchair, half stepstool… sitting poised for action… right in front of the sink.

You see, as I was about to learn, Mom was always standing over that sink washing dishes, and so my father thought the ideal birthday gift would be a chair high enough so that she could sit while washing the dishes, the stepstool functionality being an unanticipated bonus.

Of course, my Mom, being a mom of the mid 1960s, was beyond gracious at all times.  It was as if she liked everything.  Like, someone could have served her a bowl of dirt, and she’d have said thank you.

“Oh, look at that,” she said.

Now, even at six years old I was sensing something in her voice that felt like danger had just entered the room.  I swear, the temperature fell by 12 degrees… all of a sudden you could see your breath in our kitchen.

Dad was oblivious, explaining every single one of the chair’s highly valued features and functions.  “And, I bought it at Sears,” he explained as part of his wrap-up.  “So, if anything goes wrong, we can return it and they’ll give us a new one.”

Dad absolutely adored that about Sears.  He even bought his sport jackets at Sears when they would go on sale, of course, and I grew up assuming it was for the same reason… Sears’ famous return anything anytime policy.

“Isn’t that something,” Mom was saying.  She had decided that moment was a good one to start sharpening a giant kitchen knife, but then apparently thought better of it and set it down gingerly.

“Well, thank you Julian,” she said in a voice that I would one day learn to call condescending.  “That was very considerate of you.”

And that was it… Mom’s birthday was over for another year.  I knew not to ask her how old she was.  I ‘d learned the hard way the year before that a young man doesn’t ask a lady that question.  So, I just gave her a kiss on her cheek, said Happy Birthday Mom, and ran up to my room to see if I could sneak in a few minutes of black & white T.V. before they yelled up… “Turn off the T.V. please,” after which I’d drift off to sleep dreaming of riding lawnmowers and the like.

Less than a week passed until one day after school, I heard the doorbell, and ran to see who rang it.  A large truck was parked right in front of our house, on the side it read, “Sears Appliances,” or something very close.

“Maaaaam,” I called out.  It’s a man in a truck from Sears.”

My Mother came out in her apron, admonishing me for yelling for her to come in front of an adult, and then in her adult voice sweet as pie said, “Oh, hello, yes please, come in,” to the man in the Sears uniform.

And two hours later our kitchen had a brand new dishwasher installed… a Kenmore.

I didn’t connect the dots at the time, but inexplicably Mom made cupcakes again that night, highly unusual as it wasn’t anyone’s birthday, and this time she let me have the bowl of icing to lick and scrape on top of it all.  She was unusually happy and I was in sugar-induced nirvana.

After desert, we all walked into the kitchen and Mom started explaining all of the features and functionality of the new Kenmore dishwasher.

Dad listened, barely smiling occasionally, and then as I was sensing his patience was running thin he said right in the middle of Mom’s Kenmore demonstration that I was more than happy to watch, “Okay, are you finished?  I’ve got some work to do,” and with that he turned and walked towards the stairs.

Mom just kept going on about the Kenmore in a sort of sing-song voice, and as Dad started up the stairs, she was full on singing her words now and kind of dancing after him…

“And it’s from Sears… so if anything goes wrong… we can always return it,” Mom sang as if she were Judy Garland playing the role of a housewife in a movie.

I thought that I recognized the melody… “Home on the Range,” sort of.

Seconds later we could hear the door to Dad’s study close, I thought, perhaps a little harder than usual.  Mom walked back towards the kitchen humming, and without any advance notice, as she passed by me on her way to get started loading the new dishwasher, she set a second cupcake topped with icing right in front of me without saying a word.

And somehow I knew as I stared at the icing on my cupcake, there would be no percentage in asking questions.

It would be many years before I had any real appreciation for what had gone on that year… the year my Mom had two birthdays.  And the year my father had stared death in the face… and lived.

Yes, he was the Harvard man, the brilliant college professor… the breadwinner of our family… the owner of the tools… who never shirked his duty when “some assembly was required”… the one who always drove… and lit our matches when required… the patriarch.

But, make no mistake… that night Mom had let him live… let him off with a song about a Kenmore dishwasher from Sears… a song that sounded a lot like “Home on the Range.”  Now that I’m all grown up and married myself, I fully realize that a blow to the back of the head with a shovel would have been much less painful.

And I can’t quite remember when I noticed it again, but that yellow vinyl and metal chair/stepstool from Sears remained in our basement for the next twenty years… for all I know is still down there today.

Mom was never one to throw important things like that away.

I’m like that too.  So, I’m going to remember Wells Fargo’s $22,000 gift to establish a suicide hotline forever, and I hope that not only will you remember it too, but that you’ll also keep forwarding the story of Norm Rousseau to others for years to come, so they can remember what happened too.

Because although I only spoke to Norm for an hour or so… I know for sure that wherever you believe he is right now, he’ll smile through eternity if his battle and his death produced that kind of result.

Over the last two days, more people read Norm Rousseau’s story than anything I’ve ever written on Mandelman Matters.  And I wasn’t sure how I felt about that until I realized that maybe if his story spread and wasn’t forgotten, then maybe one day there wouldn’t be other stories like his for me to write.

And I can tell you that it sure would make his wife happy, give her some peace, even.  Nothing can change what happened.  But, yesterday she said that all she wants is for what happened to Norm never to happen to anyone else.

Here’s the link to NORM’S STORY.  Do more.  Do everything possible to stop this from ever happening again.  Stopping even one… matters a lot.

Do more.  Give a gift that keeps on giving.

Mandelman out.

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BRIAN!  Dude… My good friend… Mi amigo de la Hipoteca clase… My favorite lender defender from whom laughs do engender… please don’t take me an offender… but as the message’s sender… a response to you I’ll tender… and my views I’ll therefore render…

Okay, I give in… that TBWS Daily was hysterical.  I mean, people say I’m funny, but I can’t hold a candle.

Overall, I loved the show, but, if I may… there were just a couple things…  

Just to make sure I understand what you said there… the problem is that there aren’t enough homes for people to buy?  We’re having a shortage of houses for sale, are we?  Wow… you know, I was sleeping and woke up to today’s video and for a minute there, I thought I must have dozed off for a decade or more.

But seriously… I had no idea that was the problem.  Well, alrighty then… I guess I’m going back to work… Mandelman doesn’t matter anymore… our economic problems have been solved.  And, thank heavens for that, because I was getting darn tired of writing about… um… well… I guess you could refer to it as… oh, I don’t know… how about… “the truth?”

Get more houses on the market?  Seriously?  More houses is what we need?  Am I on Candid Camera, or is there a rabbit hole around here somewhere that I can’t see?

So, I guess what you’re telling me is that at this point, the banks are actually hoarding them… holding them back for their own heads?  Foreclosing on more and more of them every day because they have a plan to corner the deteriorating home market?  Or are they just trying to pay us back for bailing them out by offering to pay most of the property taxes in this country going forward?  Or, maybe they just have a handyman fetish, so the more vacant homes the better?  Nothing turns them on like monitoring property preservation companies?

Why would they be hoarding empty houses?  Correct me if I’m wrong, but I was always under the impression that empty homes COST money as a result of their tendency to… what do they call it?  Oh yeah… decompose.

Aren’t banks the ones that are always trying to MAKE money?  Or have that backwards and banks are the ones that want to have the highest possible costs?  I can never keep that one straight… like eating eggs for breakfast… are they good for me or bad for me?  I can never remember… so I eat granola.

But, I digress…

Why do you suppose it might be that banks aren’t putting more homes on the market… or in the parlance of the economist… why are they limiting supply… making sure that it remains lower than demand?

Anyone?  Anyone?  Bueller?  Bueller?

Well, it can’t be because they don’t like money, right?  Right.  Okay, good.  I was pretty sure we’d have no argument there.

Could it be that they’re just so busy foreclosing and proprietarily trading credit derivatives for fun and losses, that they just haven’t realized that there are throngs of Californians and Arizonans clamoring to buy the homes they’re holding onto?  Again, I’d have to guess that… no, that can’t be it either.

Okay, let’s try this… What happens when the demand for a good exceeds its supply?  Oh, now lets not always see the same hands…

Brian?  Is that you I see in the back of the room doodling?  What’s that a picture of?  That’s you sitting at a table refinancing a four-plex for a dentist?  Yes, that’s very nice, but we’re trying to hold a class here, so if you wouldn’t mind…

So, what happens when the demand for a good exceeds its supply? Right, Brian!  Prices go up… or actually, in this particular case, they don’t go down as quickly.

And just what do you suppose would happen if the banks decided to make a bunch of homes available for sale, as you suggested is the thing to do in today’s TBWS Daily?  Do you think prices would tend to go up or down?  I’ll give you a hint… the answer is the opposite of “up.”

And, if home prices were to go down even faster than they are as a result of all of the other factors that haven’t changed a lick, except to worsen… you know… like, unemployment, long-term unemployment, foreclosures, average incomes… GDP… the state’s $16 billion budget deficit that’s about to constrict the state’s economy even further as we cut services and raise taxes on the wealthy… those kind of things?

Well, if home prices fell further and faster I’d have to venture a guess that more people would find themselves underwater and/or further underwater… and that would mean what do you suppose?  If you guessed further reductions in consumer spending, higher unemployment and more foreclosures… well, you’d be right once again!

And then what about all the people who, having been duped into believing that housing had bottomed, bought homes recently?  Would they be gaining equity or losing it?  Losing it, right!  And assuming an FHA/new-sub-prime loan was involved many would be underwater by Christmas… and you know what that would mean, right?

Even more foreclosures!  Maybe that’s why FHA is reporting almost 20 percent defaults on loans made SINCE 2009.  It’s kind of funny if you think about it… we’re actually creating foreclosures over at FHA even faster than we can foreclose down the street at Fannie and Freddie.  It’s very “Dr. Strangelove – Or, how I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb,” don’t you think?

And I did hear you say that the shortage was “at the low end of the market,” right?  I’m sure that’s correct, because that’s the end of the market that’s not only less expensive, but also less experienced.  Those are the folks easiest to convince to buy a home because it’s never going to be this cheap or the rates this low again… so, better hurry and get your offer in today… isn’t that about right, Brian?

Of course, I wouldn’t want to leave out my favorite flavor of scumbag, the vulture investors who envision this as a once in a lifetime opportunity to become full fledged slum lords, gouging the unfortunate and credit impaired with top tier rents for at least a decade while they put the absolute minimums into maintenance and scheme to hold onto security deposits in all cases.

No, I wouldn’t want to forget them.

See, it’s not that there aren’t enough homes on the market really, right Brian?  It’s that there aren’t enough homes that can be purchased below market value that’s the problem.  Realtors don’t really want more inventory… they want more inventory that can be purchased at distressed prices.  I’ll be happy to put my home on the market tomorrow, just not at a price at which it would sell any time soon.

Don’t get me wrong… I do understand that the banks dumping homes on the market at distressed prices would make summer fun for Realtors and mortgage brokers… and Lord knows I do like seeing you guys having a good time… after all, you’re always a fun lot to have at a party.

But, since the banks doing what you suggest under today’s circumstances would only push us further into a recession, with housing prices falling even faster than they will otherwise, thus creating even more foreclosures… thus further destroying the housing and credit markets once the fun ends… well, I’d like to humbly suggest that IT’S A TERRIBLE IDEA.

So, if you put it all together… the worsening employment and overall economic conditions (except in the media where it’s an election year), combined with the tightening of the already tight credit markets… and with the unabated flood of foreclosures on the horizon (forecasted to exceed the number of homes lost to-date, by the way)… and the permanently broken private securitization market… CA’s $16 billion and growing state budget deficit… and the need for Washington D.C. to reduce spending going forward…

… to say nothing of the EU’s high wire act, sans net, that’s destined to see one or two countries fall to their deaths sooner than we think, thus causing us to nationalize or bailout several or more of our TBTF banks once again… and then factor in the possibility of Mitt Romney and the GOP actually winning in November… OMG, OMG, OMG… consider all that…

… And you’ll want to eat a gun.

But… STOP!  Don’t do that.  That is NOT the answer, Brian.

Just like it’s NOT the answer to… “put more homes on the market.”

From your good friend who loves you… and as always I remain…

Most sincerely yours…

Martin

xoxoxoxoxo…

Martin Andelman

Mandelman Matters

P.S. If I’m in town, I think I’m going to come to Anaheim to see you guys… I figure you’re just dying to buy me a beer.  And tell Frank to be careful on that bike.

Mandelman out.

Hey, to subscribe to TBWS… CLICK HERE!

Just like the last VICTIM OF WELLS FARGO I wrote about, Wells Fargo claimed that Norman and Oriane Rousseau had missed a mortgage payment.  But the payment HAD been made in person at a Wells Fargo branch by Cashier’s Check, and Mrs. Rousseau has the receipt for the transaction.

The Rousseaus file a dispute with Wells Fargo over the supposed missing payment.  Wells Fargo “investigates” and comes back saying that the Rousseaus had stopped payment on the check.  They stopped payment on a Cashier’s Check?  Seriously?

I don’t want to spend too much time on this ridiculous point, so here’s how Rousseau’s lawyer explains this technical yet wholly insipid issue, and then we’ll move on…

The teller’s receipt establishes that the cashier’s check was in the custody and control of Wachovia on April 1, 2009, and the research by the Cashiering Department should have concluded that Wachovia screwed up by not applying the cash-equivalent funds to the Rousseau’s account. After delivery and acceptance to the branch office, it was Wachovia’s responsibility to safeguard the instrument; Wachovia itself effectively stopped payment on the cashier’s check.

Okay, so let’s get back to the meat of the story…

Concerned that they could not resolve the payment dispute but told they should apply for a loan modification, the Rousseaus hired a law firm and submitted a loan modification application.  After that it was standard operating procedure at Wells Fargo… we lost this, and we lost that, resend this, and resend that… for almost a year.

Good Lord, Wells Fargo, could you please do something differently just once?  This article is almost becoming a form letter.

Wells Fargo then of course told the Rousseau family not to make their payments, that they were being considered for a loan modification and that making their payments would immediately disqualify them.

So, they saved their payments just in case Wells decided to deny them a modification.  Saved every single one just in case the bank decided to act like… well, Wells Fargo Bank.

Then Wells sent them a Notice of Default, but when they called to say they wanted to reinstate their loan, Wells said what they always say… IGNORE IT… don’t worry about it, everything’s fine, it’s just an automated sort of thing… why, you’re being considered for a loan modification.

Then Wells filed a Notice of Sale on October 28, 2010.  Their home would be sold on November 22, 2010.  And still Wells said… IGNORE IT… it’s just another automated sort of thing… your loan modification is still pending… and please re-submit some documents.

It was November 10, 2010… just 12 days before their home was to be sold… when the Wells Fargo representative told the Rousseau’s that their loan modification had been denied.  The reason: Insufficient income.

Yeah, but you know the funny thing about that is that their income hadn’t changed a nickel since they applied for the loan modification.  So, what’s the deal?  Did it take Wells Fargo a year to figure out the Rousseau’s income was insufficient?  Is that the story I’m supposed to be buying into?

You’re a liar, Wells Fargo.  Either you knew you weren’t going to approve their loan modification, or you’re the most incompetent financial institution in the history of the world.  And you don’t just do this sometimes, you do this all the time… and especially to people in their 60s or older.  Why is that do you suppose? 

In case you’re wondering what I’ve been up to, I’m actually collecting Wells Fargo stories at this point.  I figure it’ll be a hoot to put them all together into a book.  What do you think?  Should I autograph a copy for you when it’s done?

That same day the Rousseaus found a lawyer and discovered they had a RIGHT TO REINSTATE their loan.  (Nice of Wells not to tell them that, by the way.)  They contacted Wells and requested a reinstatement quote… TWO DAYS LATER Wells finally gave them the phone number for RCS, the trustee.

But, RSC said that reinstatement would take two weeks and trustee sale was going off as planned in 8 days.  Wells got them their reinstatement quote too… it was dated November 15, but received via email on November 17, 2010.

And it expired in two days and had to be received in Texas by November 19, 2010.

The Rousseaus had more than enough in savings to reinstate their loan, they told Wells Fargo that… but now they couldn’t get the money from their IRA in time for the 2-day deadline and Wells refused to postpone the sale.

So, the Rousseau’s home sold at the trustee sale on November 22, 2010.

Next the Rousseaus go through a series of lawyers.  Finally, they get a good one and in July of 2011, the court grants an injunction contingent on them making a monthly payment of $1800.

But, by December of 2011, Wells finally wore the Rousseaus down and they just couldn’t make December’s payment.  They used up all their money fighting Wells Fargo, and Norm had been unemployed since the foreclosure.  He was taking odd jobs as a handy man to make ends meet.

Wells Fargo immediately goes to court… gets the injunction dissolved… then proceeds with the Unlawful Detainer… the lockout is set for May 15th, 2012… at 6:00 AM.

THAT’S TOMORROW MORNING… AT 6:00 AM.

Over this past weekend, Norm Rousseau talked with their attorney who is working pro bono by the way.  Basically, his lawyer tells him…

“Look… let’s face the facts here.  We’ll proceed with the lawsuit.  We’ll fight like hell to get you back in the home, but you have to be ready with some sort of plan so you’re not left homeless and on the streets.”

Norm found someone who has a 27-foot motorhome he can use, but after he gets it home on Saturday… it stops running… it won’t start.  But, Norm Rousseau is a man in his 50s with mad skills.  He goes to work around the clock taking apart the engine, doing everything he can to get it running so that on Tuesday morning he will have somewhere to house his family.  He’s up all night Saturday night, but still can’t get it running.  It’s too big to tow with a car.

 

His mind must have been wandering late on Saturday night.  What must a man, a father, a provider be thinking when he knows that everything in life has somehow gone terribly wrong and there’s nothing left to do?  He must have been imagining the sheriff pulling up to evict his family on Tuesday morning… just two days away, as the motorhome’s engine lay in pieces in his driveway.

 

I can only imagine what must have been going through his mind as he worked tirelessly, without sleep, on that engine and electrical system… as the clock ticked away the hours, I’m sure going faster and faster as time was running out.  Damn, it’s already 11:00 PM… then it’s 3:00 AM… and then 5:00 AM… and then before he knew it… a most unwelcome sun was shining… 9:00 AM…

 

I can almost hear him thinking: “Damn it, what am I going to do?  How could this have happened?”  I can hear him swearing under his breath as he fights with the old parts trying to get them to work together again… I can see him staring at the engine as the will to go on was leaving his soul…

Norman and Oriane Rousseau had bought their home in Ventura, California in 2000, putting nearly 30 percent down, which was their life savings.  In 2006, every time they went into the World Savings branch they’d get pitched on refinancing into one of World’s infamous Option ARM loans… that are now illegal, I believe.  After a couple of years of being pitched, they finally bought into World Saving’s lies.

They had told World Saving’s loan officer, ERIC COOPER, that they were only interested in obtaining a conventional 30-year, fixed-rate loan.  They wanted consistent payments over the life of the loan.

But COOPER assured them that they could significantly reduce their monthly payments… by more than $600 per month, with a lower interest refinanced loan. COOPER said that the new Pick-A-Payment loan product was better suited to their situation.

He described the Payment Option ARM as the new industry standard.  He pointed out that the lower interest rate and payment flexibility were valuable advantages that were not available with other loan products.  And he said that even more importantly, unlike the previous WORLD loans, the interest rate was tied to an index with historically low rates that were continuing to decrease.

According to COOPER, industry experts projected the interest rates to continue to fall, and so their monthly payments would be EVEN LOWER than their initial payments.

Even under the worst case scenario, COOPER assured them, the historical data for the index indicated that changes in the interest rate would only be slight, and if an increase should occur it would have a negligible effect on their monthly payments… no more than a few dollars.

And besides, COOPER explained, the loan would only be around for a couple years, as they should expect to refinance within the next two years to take advantage of even more favorable interest rates and as the steadily rising housing values would surely increase the amount of their equity in the property.

Then COOPER went for the close…

On the condition that the Rousseaus apply for the new loan that very day, he would agree to waive their pre-payment penalty, stating that there would be virtually no costs to refinance beyond a $35.00 application fee.

Yeah, COOPER, you’re a real peach.

COOPER also convinced the Rousseaus that it was in their best financial interests to consolidate approximately $25,000 in unsecured debt in the refinance transaction, citing the benefits of the lower interest rate and the convenience of having only one payment.

The Rousseaus provided COOPER with accurate and truthful information regarding their income and assets, and COOPER was such a nice guy that he offered to complete the Quick Qualifying Loan Application on their behalf.

Gee, thanks COOPER.

It was right around November 1, 2007, that WACHOVIA arranged for a notary to complete the closing at the Rousseau’s home.  The notary discouraged their review of the documents and directed them straight to the signature lines, but the Rousseaus noticed that a pre-payment penalty in excess of $4000.00 was included in the closing costs… the fee that COOPER had promised to waive if they applied that same day.  They called COOPER and he apologized for the oversight, but tried to get them to sign anyway, because it would only add a couple of bucks to their payment.

They said… no… they’d reschedule the appointment and wait for the four grand to be taken off their bill, thank you very much.

Two weeks later, the notary returned and they signed the paperwork for their new $368,000 state of the art loan.

Now, the Rousseaus didn’t know it at the time, but COOPER was a lying sack of garbage that had misrepresented just about everything having to do with their new loan.

The 7.2% interest rate of the new loan was actually higher than their old loan and higher than the 6.8% quoted by COOPER.  The “significant reduction in monthly payments” was an illusion accomplished by comparing the fully amortized payment of the 2006 loan with the negative amortizing minimum payment due under the new loan.

The new loan, at annual change dates, added deferred interest to principal and the loan amortized, with payment increases capped at 7.5% for ten years.  Then, the new loan recast when negative amortization reached 125%.

The Rousseaus were never told about the new loan’s fully amortizing payment of $2,497.94 per month, in fact their payment amount was intentionally misrepresented by COOPER.  And the new monthly payment could never decrease because it represented the minimum payment possible… the negatively amortizing option that meant payments would increase at each change date.

But that wasn’t enough for our boy COOPER.  The Rousseaus were charged $2,640.00 in origination fees for the “low cost” refinance, which made a tidy profit for World/Wachovia/Wells/Whatever bank.

And best of all, an undisclosed Yield Spread Premium (“YSP”) of $4,195 was charged for placing them in a loan with an interest rate .50% higher than they qualified for, and that YSP increased their monthly payments by $123.32, or $44,395.20 over the life of the loan.

The truth is that the Rousseaus were a heck of a long way from being considered well qualified for their new loan. Their fully amortized payment represented a total debt-to-income ratio of 27.91%, but that percentage was based on income figures that were grossly overstated by guess who? That’s right… COOPER.

The Rousseaus told COOPER their total gross annual income was, $76,000, but somehow it got listed as $136,800 on the application.  You know… the application that good old COOPER was nice enough to fill out for the Rousseaus.

So, it was Sunday… yesterday… around 10:00 AM… and Norm couldn’t get the motorhome running.  He must have realized that he couldn’t handle the shame of seeing his wife and stepson evicted with nowhere to go… living on the street.  I don’t know how anyone could face that reality.  I don’t think I could. 

 

How could it be that just 12 years before they had put their life savings down on their first and likely last home?  They had done everything right, but nothing was right anymore, and I’m sure to Norm Rousseau, nothing would ever be right again. 

 

Their church had offered to help them, maybe find them somewhere to stay temporarily, and that would be fine for his wife and her son… but not for him.  I’m sure he wept as he looked at the engine parts laying there, realizing that it was over.

 

Norm Rousseau called me a couple of months ago.  He wasn’t asking me to help him, in fact, he never even told me about what he was going through with Wells Fargo.  No, Norm was concerned about someone else who was losing a home.  A really good person who’s done so much for so many others, was how he described her.  It wasn’t right what the banks were doing he said.  He was hoping that I could do something to help someone he knew, because she was someone who had helped others… but he didn’t say a word about himself.

 

Norman Rousseau gave up over that engine that sits in pieces in his driveway today, the sun shining down making the metal parts hot to the touch.  Maybe it was the frustration of having nowhere to turn for justice, maybe it was the shame he felt that somehow he had let his family down… even though that was not the case at all.

 

Sometime mid-morning on Sunday Norm Rousseau ended his own life.  He went into his garage and shot himself.  At one point he could have reinstated his loan, that’s what he had planned to do, but Wells Fargo had made that impossible… they stripped him of everything he had.

And now, his wife and stepson are to be evicted at 6:00 AM tomorrow morning.  They have nowhere to go, they have no money, they are still in shock over the loss of Norm.

And I don’t know what to do really.  I’m going to call the sheriff’s office in Ventura… see if I can persuade them to drag their feet for a week before locking them out.  Their lawyer is trying to file something with the courts, but maybe you can think of something too.

Maybe you can forward this article to people in the media.  Tell them what’s going on… maybe someone will care enough to do something.  It’s 11:21 AM and I’ve been up all night again, I can’t really keep this up much longer… but somehow I felt like telling Norm’s story was the very least I could do.

Since Wells Fargo had already done the very least they could do.

Rest in peace, Norm Rousseau.

Mandelman out.

John Stumpf, CEO

john.g.stumpf@wellsfargo.com

Or, by phone: (415) 396-7018 or (866) 878-5865

Or, if you want to have some fun, since I know this physical address is correct, why not grab an envelope, buy a stamp and reach out to him via regular mail.  For extra smiles, consider throwing old keys in with your letter, or I’ve always enjoyed tossing a small handful of sunflower seeds in before sealing…

John G. Stumpf

Chief Executive Officer

Wells Fargo Bank

420 Montgomery St.

San Francisco, CA 94163

For a copy of the complaint in the Rousseau’s

lawsuit against Wells Fargo…

CLICK HERE.

This past week, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon announced that his bank lost $2 billion trading credit default swaps.  It was destined to become a major news story, and sure enough everyone and their cousin wrote about it from every conceivable angle, the consensus being that the loss exemplifies the need for Dodd-Frank, the Volker Rule, and even Glass-Steagall type legislation.

So, no surprise there, right?  I mean, JPMorgan Chase losing $2 billion in a little over a month betting on credit default swaps is pretty much why U.S. taxpayers ended up having to pump trillions into TBTF banks just a few years ago.

Dimon was quoted as having said that just because his bank had been stupid, it didn’t mean that all the other banks would be equally stupid.  But, see… it sort of does, right?  That’s why the sort of risk we’re talking about is termed, “systemic,” right?  That’s why all the Wall Street banks became insolvent at the same time, right?

The simple fact is that if JPMorgan Chase is being an idiot in it’s proprietary trading strategies, history shows us that chances are overwhelmingly that the other bankers are going to be idiots too.  Maybe not on the same day; okay fine.  But, within a matter of weeks or certainly months… for sure.

Oh, I know Wells Fargo will deny having done whatever it is that the other idiots have done, whenever bets go bad, but then we’ll soon find out that they were lying and not only did the same thing, but they did it to an even greater degree than the other morons du jour of the financial aristocracy.

The story of Dimon’s $2 billion loss got so big that Jamie even showed up to issue a mea culpa, Sunday morning on this week’s “Meet the Press.”  Among other things, he said…

“This is a stupid thing that we should never have done, but we’re still going to earn a lot of money this quarter, so it isn’t like the company is jeopardized.  We hurt ourselves and our credibility, yes – and that you’ve got to fully expect and pay the price for that.”

A billion here and a billion there…

The point that JPMorgan Chase is going to “earn” a lot of money this quarter is not only completely irrelevant, but it highlights another part of the problem we’re having with our mega-banks.

For one thing, and I can’t believe I even have to say this, losing $2 billion in a quarter at any corporation is supposed to be a significant problem.  If it’s not, then the corporation is gouging its customers with the expectation that it will need a multi-billion cushion to make up for its tendency to lose billions through stupidity at any given moment.

And for another thing, saying that this time around the stupidity isn’t going to jeopardize JPMorgan Chase’s future solvency, is not the point.

The point is, what will happen when the bank’s stupidity and obvious addiction to gambling does threaten to jeopardize the bank’s solvency.  What happens then?

Does the bank file bankruptcy?  Does the FDIC take it over, fire the executives, clean it up and re-sell it to the private sector?  Or, does it just mean that the U.S. taxpayer is forced to bail out the bank once again because it’s deemed too big to fail?  Because as long as it’s the latter… that’s the point.

Dimon also commented on the things he said a few weeks ago during a conference call, when he referred to the danger of what ultimately happened as being “a tempest in a teapot,” which is an idiom that refers to a small thing that’s been blown out of proportion.  On “Meet the Press,” Dimon said…

“So first of all, I was dead wrong when I said that.  I obviously didn’t know because I never would have said that. And one of the reasons we came public was because we wanted to say, ‘You know what, we told you something that was completely wrong a mere four weeks ago.’”

Yes, and that’s also the point, is it not?  Like all human beings, even the CEO of JPMorgan Chase can simply be wrong.  And the American taxpayer doesn’t want to be on the hook for however many billions wrong he or she is from time to time because what happened here that cost the bank $2 billion didn’t have anything to do with commercial banking.  So, there’s no reason in the world for us to be involved.

If we weren’t involved… if we could be sure that we weren’t going to be on the hook for the bank’s insolvency, then we wouldn’t care about any of this.  JPMorgan Chase could place multi-billion bets on which side of a room a fly will land on for all we would care.  We’d gladly sit on the sidelines and cheer as the bank gambled hundreds of billions on the derivatives of derivatives of derivatives.  We’d even go pay-per-view, like the ultimate poker challenge.

We like gamblers and big bets… we’re just too wimpy to be involved in making them ourselves.  Besides, we never seem to get to participate in the upside of these things, only the downside.

Success-haters hurt our recovery…

Lastly, Dimon said something during his interview that really got my goat.  Basically, he said that he’s sick of Americans being resentful of “success,” that “attacks on successful people,” were somehow harming our economic recovery.  And I have to say something about that because it’s just out of control ridiculous.

Americans are absolutely NOT resentful of success, in fact, we adore success… worship it, even.  In fact, success is like… our favorite thing in the whole world.  We’re success junkies.

In truth, we don’t resent failure either.  What we do resent is failure that comes as a result of irresponsible gambling in entirely unregulated environments and for which we have no choice but to pick up the tab.  That, we most definitely resent, at the very least.  We actually hate that with the white-hot intensity of a thousand suns.

We also resent that JPMorgan Chase was bailed out by taxpayers in 2008 and 2009, and continues to be allowed to profit based on a slew of special loan programs and accounting accommodations, while simultaneously foreclosing at will on homeowners who are only in their current situation because of Wall Street’s unregulated gambling addiction, appalling lack of judgment, and non-existent risk management systems.

Oh, and admittedly we’re not exactly nuts over Jamie’s $20.8 million in compensation for 2010 either, I suppose.  In 2010, his compensation went up by 1500 percent increase over the $1.3 million he was paid in 2009, if I’ve got my numbers right… and I do.  That’s one heck of a raise, I’d say.  What in the world did he do in 2010 that justified a 1500 percent raise?

(According to Reuters, he did quite a bit better than that in 2010, cashing in options and grants awarded during previous years for a grand total of $42 million that year.  And that same year his compensation also included $421458 in “moving expenses,” which would make total sense had he relocated from Chicago to the Uhuru Peak of Mount Kilimanjaro maybe.)

And all of that is to say nothing about the $35.8 million he received in 2008, the year he piloted his ship directly into the rocks and sunk it, were it not for the largesse of the U.S. taxpayer.  That was certainly a “successful year,” right Mr. Dimon?

You see, it’s not because we resent success that we give Jamie Dimon such a hard time, it’s because these days, we have a hard time viewing Dimon as “a success.”

Now, maybe if he would disclose his bank’s credit default swap counterparty positions, and off-balance sheet transactions, and conformed to GAAP accounting principals for valuing assets and recognizing losses… maybe then…

Or, maybe if his bank modified mortgages that were NPV positive even if it required a principal forbearance or, God forbid, a reduction, because keeping people in homes under these circumstances is simply the right thing to do.  Or, maybe if he just supported some sort of reasonable plan to handle things better than they’ve been handled to-date for America’s homeowners…

I’m sure then, we’d see Jamie Dimon as a major success, and wouldn’t care so much how much money he made…

Ya’ think?

Mandelman out.

In case you missed JPMorgan Chase’s CEO, Jamie Dimon on Meet the Press, hereeees… JAMIE!

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

You have found the Mandelman Matters state specific series of pages dedicated to homeowners at risk of foreclosure in Utah.

On the pages in this section you’ll find accurate, straightforward information and guidance specific to the State of Utah related to such topics as loan modifications, short sales, foreclosure defense litigation, bankruptcy… and other topics related to getting through the foreclosure crisis.

We’ve created these Utah specific pages in response to the proliferation of scammers polluting the Internet with misinformation and outright lies intended to sell something to homeowners at risk of foreclosure that they don’t need.  These sites are literally everywhere, and some are very good at appearing credible, when in fact they are nothing more than elaborate cons.

Well, we’ve taken great care to make sure that the information you’ll find here is always correct… always impartial… always based on real facts… and always easy to understand.

In case you’re not already familiar with me, my name is Martin Andelman and for going on four years, I’ve been writing the widely read blog Mandelman Matters.  Over the last three and a half years, I’ve written more than 650 in-depth articles covering the political, economic, social and legal aspects of the financial and foreclosure crises.

I decided that I had to do more to help stop homeowners from getting ripped off, by providing the state specific information homeowners need to make the right decisions for their individual goals and circumstances.  Moving forward on the best possible path… that’s what my state specific pages are all about.

And just so you know, I’ve never been in the mortgage business or the real estate business, but for more than twenty years I’ve been a writer that specializes in making complex subjects easy for people to understand… oh yeah, and people say I’m funny.  I have in-depth experience writing about subjects that fall under the broad headings of accounting, insurance, financial services and law.

You can read a lot more about me HERE, HERE, and HERE.

You may want to start by getting to know my trusted attorney for the State of Utah, Walter Keane.

No one pays to be listed as a trusted attorney on Mandelman Matters… that’s just not how it works.  The lawyers I list as trusted… are simply those I trust.  And when I say that, I mean that I would trust these people to represent me, or to watch my house while I went away on vacation for the summer.

In order to write close to 700 articles on the economic situation we’re facing today, I had to learn everything possible about the mortgage and foreclosure crises.  Not only did I read dozens of books, research reports, court decisions, and more… I also had to interview a lot of people and many were attorneys from all over the country.  Over time, some became good friends.  So, when homeowners would call me to ask if I could recommend a lawyer, I would refer them to one that I had gotten to know well, and trusted.

So, in Utah, my trusted attorney is Walter Keane, and if you CLICK HERE, you’ll be taken to the Utah state specific page on which you can get to know him by watching a documentary style video on which Walter talks about the foreclosure crisis in Utah.

Walter became somewhat famous last year when he successfully quieted the title for four Utah homeowners.  Unfortunately, as he explains, that window is no linger open in Utah, but there are still things that can be done to fight a foreclosure action.  To hear a Mandelman Matters podcast featuring Walter Keane, CLICK HERE.

As a Mandelman Matters trusted attorney, Walter has agreed to take calls from Utah homeowners who have questions about foreclosures, and help them by providing answers regardless of whether the caller decides to hire his firm or not.  So, if you want to talk with someone who knows foreclosure in Utah, please don’t hesitate to call him.

For Walter’s contact information CLICK HERE.

And, if you’re looking for State Resources, CLICK HERE.

Need to know more about Utah Foreclosure Laws, CLICK HERE.

Want to read my latest post about Utah on Mandelman Matters?

Deceptive Foreclosure Headlines Spread Like Wild Fire in Utah

Finally, there are places online where homeowners, lawyers and other advocates can go to lodge complaints about a mortgage servicer’s handling of mortgage modifications, et al.  And all I can say is, it’s about time.

A story by Ben Hallman in the Huffington Post, quoted Joseph Smith, the ex-banking commissioner charged with enforcing the national mortgage settlement…

“This allows me, as monitor, to hear complaints and learn more about advocates’ impressions of how the settlement is working,” he said. “Although I’ll extensively review reports and monitoring from the banks and my own team of auditors, it is still critical for me to receive information from the heart of each community this settlement serves.”

Now, it’s probably at least somewhat important to remember that Smith has no power to investigate individual complaints or help individual homeowners in any way. Here’s what it says on the complaint form in bold…

“Please note that the Monitor cannot intervene with the servicer on behalf of your individual client.”

Of course, I’d also guess that he doesn’t have the manpower to read the hundreds of thousands of complaints the sites would no doubt receive if homeowners and their lawyers were actually to hear about the website.  (I’m also betting that there’s not much of an advertising budget with which they’ll be getting the word out across the nation.)

But, so what?  There may be another way to view these new online complaint sites.

Sure, there won’t be any action taken based on the complaints filed online, and nothing will likely change as a result.  And I realize that if a homeowner is being dual-tracked, can’t get a response from a mortgage servicer for months, or is losing a home to a wrongful foreclosure, these sites may only represent websites effectively dedicated to ignoring complaints online.

But, wait… there may be more.  Here’s what it says on the new sites…

“The Monitor and the Office of Mortgage Settlement Oversight can assist you by providing information about the organization in your state that is appropriate for you depending on your situation. By filling out the simple form below, you will open a webpage that has state-specific contact information of various organizations that may be able to help you. The Monitor will use this information to better understand how the servicers are treating their customers and detect any patterns in violation of the agreement.”

So, I really do hope that everyone takes advantage of the new websites should they have problems with their servicers related to the National Mortgage Settlement.  Here’s what Mr. Smith says about the two new sites…

“Lawyers, caseworkers and other consumer advocates are the eyes and ears on the ground who will know first, and know intimately, what kind of difference these payments, adjustments and programs are making,” Smith said. “That’s why we’ve created this dedicated tool -– to see what they’re seeing.”

Look, people… the man used to be the banking commissioner in North Carolina, but now Mr. Smith has gone to Washington and he says he needs us to be his “eyes and ears on the ground,” as far as the AG settlement’s effectiveness goes.  So, let’s not let him down, okay?

Besides, if you consider the math, the whole thing becomes that much more fun…

Assuming one person can read a complaint in 10 minutes, and they were to read them 6 hours each day, working the standard 2080 hours a year, it would take 1.3 years to read 100,000 complaints.

So, if the same numbers applied and there were a million complaints, it would take 13.3 years for one person… they’d need to hire a thousand people to get it done in 1.3 years.  And that assumes everyone is writing fairly short complaints.  Stretch those babies out to a 20-minute read and now we’re talking two thousand people to read them in 1.3 years.

So, look… do you want to help create jobs in this country or what?  Oh, and don’t forget to attach a large file to your complaint, I’m sure the servers are quite robust, and someone may want to read the details.  Like they said back in the 60s… can you dig what I’m saying here?

So, for HOMEOWNERS who want to file a complaint having to do with the National Mortgage Settlement, click here: WHERE CAN I FIND HELP?

For LAWYERS or ADVOCATES. click here: REPORT CLIENT ISSUES HERE.

Here’s a list of topics under which your complaint may fall, as listed on the new sites…

Documentation: Documentation problems with foreclosure, bankruptcy or your loan file

Fees: Improper assessment of fees, including default, foreclosure, bankruptcy, attorney, late, or third party fees.

Loan Modification: Failure to modify or refinance loan.

Customer Service: Poor customer service, including no single point of contact or no customer portal.

Third Party Firms: Failure to properly oversee firms working for servicer on your mortgage.

Military Personnel: Failure to comply with legal protections afforded military personnel.

Bankruptcy: Improper failure to provide relief to homeowners in bankruptcy.

Force Placed Insurance: Required purchase of property insurance unnecessarily or improperly.

Community Blight: Failure to minimize community blight.

Tenant Rights: Violation of the rights of tenants in foreclosed properties.

Other: __________.  No issues. I just would like further information

The Huffington Post story also pointed out that the federal government has also made available two other avenues where borrowers can appeal for direct assistance.

1. CFPB

One is the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”), which you can access here: File a Mortgage Complaint.  According to the Huffington Post, the CFPB,

“… promises to forward a grievance to the financial institution, assign it a tracking number and keep borrowers updated on the status.”

So, that’s very exciting, I would think.  I mean, if nothing else it sounds like you’ll have your very own individual tracking number, so that’s something right there.  I wonder how effective it will be when trying to persuade a judge not to have you evicted?

“But, hold on Your Honor… not so fast… have I showed you my tracking number?”

 

2. The OCC

And for homeowners who were in foreclosure during 2009 and 2010, don’t forget about the OCC’s infamously dishonest and entirely corrupt, Independent Foreclosure Review, which you can access here: Submit a Request for Review.  I visited the site to check out what would be involved and the best part was that right in the middle of the page there’s a warning for homeowners that reads:

“Watch out for scams – There is only one Independent Foreclosure Review.”

So, for parents reading this who have been looking for a really good example with which you could teach your children the meaning of the word “IRONY,” I’d have to say that your search has ended. 

The deadline to submit your complaint is July 31^st, so if you’re planning to be condescendingly placated by the equivocation of your claims, you don’t want to put it off.  Fewer than three percent of eligible homeowners have submitted their cases for review, so the Obama Administration is no doubt planning to announce that 97 percent of those foreclosed on during those two years were okay with it.  I think that’s really taking one for the team, and I, for one, salute you.

And although it would seem that no flaws have been uncovered as yet, that’s no reason not to participate in the process.  I mean, look… someone has to win something, right?  Like the lottery.  Or, maybe not in this case… I really don’t know.

Here’s what the OCC’s site says about the review:

“The Independent Foreclosure Review will determine whether individual borrowers suffered financial injury and should receive compensation or other remedy because of errors or other problems during their home foreclosure process.”

The OCC’s site also STRONGLY WARNS HOMEOWNERS who want to file their case for independent review NOT TO PAY A LAWYER to help them do it under any circumstances.

Good heavens no… who would ever think of doing such a thing?  I mean, give us some credit, would you?

I think everybody knows by now that when it comes to authoring a document that alleges the suffering of financial injury for which damages or other remedy may be assessed in conjunction with errors committed by a party purporting to be the holder in due course or to have been assigned the rights of a beneficiary to a deed of trust, and or the substitute trustee who is seeking to enforce said rights as part of a foreclosure or unlawful detainer action… the last thing you’d ever want to do is hire a lawyer.

Sheesh, it’s not like we’re children.

After all, we handled getting our mortgages all by ourselves, initialing and signing all those contractual pages containing 3 point type about how our snapping turtle, spring loaded mortgage might result in payments that exceed our monthly income by three-fold at a time when the credit markets would require a 780 FICO and 30 percent equity to refinance.

And if we can competently handle that sort of complicated transaction, surely we all know not to pay a lawyer a nickel for something as simple as filing a complaint with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.

Look, even if the OCC finds nothing was wrong with the foreclosures in 2009 or 2010, I think we’ll all be able to join in a giant collective sigh of relief.  At least we’ll know that no one “suffered financial injury” because of errors in the foreclosure process during those two years, and we can finally move from insult to injury as we close the chapter on the unnecessary destruction of some two million family’s lives.

It reminds me of the stress tests they use with the banks… you know, the ones where every bank always passes.  Like something from a Monty Python skit.  Aren’t those the best?

Move along people, there’s nothing to see here.

Mandelman out.