Posted on 03/04/2012 4:05:25 PM PST by Chuckmorse
Why has it taken the Obama Administration over three years to address the foreclosure scandal and have they actually addressed it? The scandal, which has been referred to in some quarters as “Foreclosure-gate” involves mortgage companies using a phony practice called “robo-signing” in order to fraudulently foreclose on homeowners. The company behind most of these robo-signings is Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, known as MERS. This national company has served as a clearinghouse and as a rapid computer generated paperwork processor for the big banks and secondary mortgage investors seeking to process and re-process mortgages.
MERS tracks an average of 65 million mortgages by computer and processes mortgage transactions without human intervention. The MERS process is presently being challenged in court in several states and jurisdictions.
MERS worked closely with Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and the other big national mortgage lenders in the years leading up to the mortgage meltdown and the Trillian dollar TARP bailout. MERS had aided in the process of bundling, credit default swaps, and derivative leveraging by making the process seamless and efficient.
Before becoming Attorney General, Eric Holder worked as a partner in the white show law firm Covington & Burling which represented MERS. In 2006, while Holder was a partner, Covington and Burling defended MERS in a growing number of lawsuits brought by local municipalities and title providers which claimed that MERS was bypassing conventional methods of processing mortgages. It should be noted that as Attorney General, Eric Holder has failed to investigate these practices by MERS, Fannie and Freddie, and by the banks who received TARP funds. There have been no investigations, indictments, or significant changes in the status quo regarding these banking practices since Holder and Obama have been in office. Indeed, billions in TARP funds continue to flow to Fannie and Freddie.
Once the robo-signing scandal came to light, after a 60 Minutes expose in October, 2010, Holder, under political pressure, assigned several investigators, like himself former employees of Covington and Burling, to the case. Holder also directed the FBI to partner with the Mortgage Banking Association, MBA, which represents the banks implicated in this practice, as part of their investigation. Working together, Holder’s FBI and the MBA, developed a definition of mortgage fraud which exempts the big banks. Thus the banks will not be investigated under the protective wing of the Obama Administration. Instead, the FBI will go after small-time operators and mortgage holders.
Meanwhile, the foreclosure settlement is so confusing and vague that it is unlikely any relief will be received by those who were defrauded by the robo-signatures any time soon. In fact, it is being projected that the practical effect of the settlement will be that banks will increase the number of foreclosures with the assurance that they will be protected by the immunity clause in the agreement. Another byproduct of the settlement has been that housing courts around the country have become choked with backlog of cases. All the while, Obama is trotting out the agreement as a cornerstone of his justification for re-election.
The failure of the Obama Administration Attorney General Holder to investigate the mortgage scandal should be the focus of a congressional investigation. Such an investigation might open the whole can or worms around the TARP bailout of Fannie, Freddie and the big banks and the Obama Administration’s tepid actions toward banking reform and investigation of fraud.
Because the regulators, Fannie, Freddie, HUD knew about it all along and were just waiting for the reelection to demonize banks and Wall Street?
So Holder once again protects his cronies. What a corrupt bastid!
ML/NJ
Oh, I thought this was about Obomba Foreclosing the US...
It happened to my wife and me. They started sending us dirtygrams at Thanksgiving and notified us they were selling our house at auction over Christmas. They had their hooks in our bank account and refused to pay their own parent company on purpose. The mortgage money was going out every month so we never noticed. I still don’t know where the money was going. It took us three months to straighten it out and the bank never even apologized.
“MERS tracks an average of 65 million mortgages by computer and processes mortgage transactions without human intervention”
Several (many?) states require a ‘wet signature’, properly notarized copy of the paperwork for any transfer of deed. Electronic transfers are not sufficient. Borrowers still owe a mortgage to someone, but who has the legal aurhority to foreclose if the deed transfer was illegal?
Karl Denninger at http://www.market-ticker.org had several articles about this practice.
“Empty houses for rent! Get your empty house and rent it! Just pay the government! Houses for rent!”
From this reply I can only guess that you do not know what a mortgage is.
ML/NJ
ML/NJ
Does anyone know if perjury, forgery and Fraud on the Court is still illegal? Or can it be used against people you think deserve to have it used against them?
technical violation - nobody is foreclosing on anyone that is making their payments.
Also, MERS does not "process" mortgages - it tracks ownership. States don't like it because mortgage owners don't pay recording fees for assignments every time they transfer ownership of a mortgage.
What was your bank? So, we will know to avoid them.
see market-ticker.org if you want to everythinng there is about the mortgage scam, Karl sums it up best, there are numerous articles posted here by Karl Deninger that are written so everyone can understand the MAJOR FRAUD we have with the banking industry
W and his Treasury Sec protected their buddies, too.
In the generic sense when some one says they owe on a motgage to the bank.
Yep; the ruling class protects its own.
Wells Fargo immediately sold? moved? my mortgage to freddie Mac when I had to refinace due to the sewer system “crapping” out.
Your comment about mortgage transfer fees is interesting but I think we already have one poster here who would challenge your statement quoted about.
ML/NJ
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