UCC Hierarchy of Rights to Enforce Note and Mortgage

Posted on September 10, 2018 by Neil Garfield

HAPPY NEW YEAR to readers who celebrate Rosh Hashanah! To all others, have a HAPPY DAY. This is a prescheduled article.

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I have assembled a partial list of various possible claimants on the note and various possible claimants on the mortgage. Which one of these scenarios fits with your case? Once you review them you can see why most law students fall asleep when taking a class on bills and notes. Some of these students became practicing attorneys. Some even became judges. All of them think they know, through common sense, who can enforce a note and under what circumstances you can enforce a mortgage.

But common sense does not get you all the way home. It works, once you understand the premises behind the laws that set forth the rights of parties seeking to enforce a note or the parties seeking to enforce a mortgage. The only place to start is (1) knowing the fact pattern alleged as to the note (2) knowing the fact pattern alleged as to the mortgage and (2) looking at the laws of the state in which the foreclosure is pending to see exactly how that state adopted the Uniform Commercial Code as the law of that state.

I don’t pretend that I have covered every base. And it is wise to consider the requirements of law, as applied to the note, and the requirements of equity as applied to the mortgage.

In general, the UCC as adopted by all 50 states makes it fairly easy to enforce a note if you have possession (Article 3).

And in general, the UCC as adopted by all 50 states, increases the hurdles if you wish to enforce a mortgage through foreclosure. (Article 9).

The big one on mortgages is that the foreclosing party must have paid value for the mortgage which means the foreclosing party must have purchased the debt. But that is not the case with notes — except in the case of someone claiming to be a holder of the note in due course. A holder in due course does not step into the lender’s shoes — but all other claimants listed below do step into the lender’s shoes.

The other major issue is that foreclosing on a mortgage invokes the equitable powers of the court whereas suing on the note is simply an action at law. In equity the court takes into consideration whether the outcome of foreclosure is correct in the circumstances. In suits on notes the court disregards such concerns.

Knowing the differences means either winning or losing.

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UCC Hierarchy 18-step Program – Notes and Mortgages

The following is a list of attributes wherein a party can seek to enforce the note and mortgage if they plead and prove their status:

  1. Payee with possession of original note and mortgage.
  2. Payee with lost or destroyed original note but has original mortgage.
  3. Payee with lost or destroyed original note and lost or destroyed original mortgage.
  4. Holder in Due Course with original note endorsed by payee and original mortgage and assignment of mortgage by mortgagee.
  5. Holder in due course with lost or destroyed note but has original mortgage.
  6. Holder in due course with lost or destroyed original note and lost or destroyed original mortgage.
  7. Holder with rights to enforce with possession of original note and original mortgage.
  8. Holder with rights to enforce with lost or destroyed original note but has original mortgage.
  9. Holder with rights to enforce with lost or destroyed original note but does not have original mortgage.
  10. Possessor with rights to enforce original note and original mortgage
  11. Former Possessor with rights to enforce lost or destroyed note and original mortgage
  12. Former Possessor with rights to enforce lost or destroyed note but does not have original mortgage.
  13. Non-possessor with rights to enforce original note and original mortgage (3rd party agency)
  14. Non-possessor with rights to enforce lost or destroyed note (3rd party agency) and rights to enforce original mortgage
  15. Non-Possessor with rights to enforce lost or destroyed note (3rd party agency) but does not have the original mortgage.
  16. Assignee of purchased original mortgage with possession of original mortgage but no rights to enforce note.
  17. Assignee of purchased original mortgage without possession of original mortgage and no rights to enforce note.
  18. Purchaser of debt but lacking assignment of mortgage, endorsement on the note, and now has learned that the loan was purchased in the name of a third party and lacking privity with said third party. [This category is not directly addressed in the UCC. It is new, in the world of claims of securitization]

Facts matter. It is only by careful examination of the fact pattern and comparing the facts with the attributes listed in the UCC that you can determine the strategy for a successful foreclosure defense strategy. For example if the XYZ Trust is named as the foreclosing party and 123 Servicing is holding the original note and perhaps even the original mortgage, who has the right to foreclose and under what lawful scenario — and why?

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Filed under: foreclosure | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments »

Impact of Serial Asset Sales on Investors and Borrowers

Posted on June 7, 2018 by Neil Garfield

The real parties in interest are trying to make money, not recover it.

The Wilmington Trust case illustrates why borrower defenses and investor claims are closely aligned and raises some interesting questions. The big question is what do you do with an empty box at the bottom of an organizational chart or worse an empty box existing off the organizational chart and off balance sheet?

At the base of this is one simple notion. The creation and execution of articles of incorporation does not create the corporation until they are submitted to a regulatory authority that in turn can vouch for the fact that the corporation has in fact been created. But even then that doesn’t mean that the corporation is anything more than a shell. That is why we call them shell corporations.

The same holds true for trusts which must have beneficiaries, a trustor, a trust instrument, and a trustee that is actively engaged in managing the assets of the trust for the benefit of the beneficiaries. Without the elements being satisfied in real life, the trust does not exist and should not be treated as though it did exist.

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The banks have been pulling the wool over our eyes for two decades, pretending that the name of a REMIC Trust invokes and creates its existence. They have done the same with named Trustees and asserted “Master Servicers” of the asserted trust. Without a Trustor passing title to money or property to the named Trustee, there is nothing in trust.

Therefore whatever duties, obligations, powers or restrictions that exist under the asserted trust instrument do not apply to assets that have not been entrusted to the trustee to administer for the benefit of named beneficiaries.

The named Trustee or Servicer has nothing to claim if their claim derives from the existence of a trust. And of course a nonexistent trust has no claim against borrowers in which the beneficiaries of the trust, if they exist, have disclaimed any interest in the debt, note or mortgage.

The serial nature of asserted transfers in which servicing rights, claims for recovery of servicer advances, and purported ownership of note and mortgage is well known and leaves most people, including judges and regulators scratching their heads.

An assignment of mortgage without a a transfer of the indebtedness that is claimed to be secured by a mortgage or deed of trust means nothing. It is a statement by one party, lacking in any authority to another party. It says I hereby transfer to you the power to enforce the mortgage or deed of trust. It does not say you can keep the proceeds of enforcement and it does not identify the party to whom the debt will be paid as proceeds of liquidation of the home at or after the foreclosure sale.

As it turns out, many times the liquidation results in surplus funds — i.e., proceeds in excess of the asserted debt. That should be turned over to the borrower, but it isn’t; and that has spawned a whole new cottage industry of services offering to reclaim the surplus proceeds.

In most cases the proceeds are less than the amount demanded. But there are proceeds. Those are frequently swallowed whole by the real party in interest in the foreclosure — the asserted Master Servicer who claims the proceeds as recovery of servicer advances without the slightest evidence that the asserted Master Servicer ever paid anything nor that the asserted Master Servicer would be out of pocket in the event the “recovery” of “servicer advances” failed.

The foreclosure of the property proceeds with full knowledge that whatever the result, there are no creditors who will receive any money or benefit. The real parties are trying to make money, not recover it. And whatever proceeds or benefits might arise from the foreclosure action are grabbed by a party in a self-proclaimed assertion that while the foreclosure was brought in the name of a trust, the proceeds go to a different third party in derogation of the interests of the asserted trusts and the alleged investors in those trusts who are somehow not beneficiaries.

So investors purchase certificates in which the fine print usually says that for their own protection they disclaim any interest in the underlying debt, note or mortgages. Accordingly we have a trust without beneficiaries.

The existence of those debts, notes or mortgages becomes irrelevant to the investors because they have a promise from a trustee who is indemnified on behalf of a trust that owns nothing. The certificates are backed by assets of any kind. Even if they were “backed” by assets, the supposed beneficiaries have disclaimed such interests.

Thus not only does the trust own nothing even the prospect of security has been traded off to other investors who paid money on the expectation of revenue from the notes and mortgages claimed by the asserted trust through its named trustee.

In the end you have a name of a trust that is unregistered and never asserted to be organized and existing under the laws of any jurisdiction, trustee who has no duties and even if such duties were present the asserted trust instrument strips away all trustee functions, no beneficiaries, and no res, and no active business requiring administration nor any business record of such activity.

Yet the trust is the entity that  is chosen as the named Plaintiff in foreclosures. But the way it reads one is bound to believe that assumption that is not and never was true or even asserted: that the case involves the trustee bank for anything more than window dressing.

It is the serial nature of the falsely asserted transfers that obscures the real parties in interest in both securities transactions with investors and loans with borrowers. The unavoidable conclusion is that nothing asserted by the banks (players in  falsely claimed securitization schemes) is real.

Filed under: CASES, CORRUPTION, Eviction, evidence, Fabrication of documents, foreclosure, Servicer | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | 9 Comments »

JUDICIAL NOTICE IS BEING USED AS A SUBSTITUTE FOR PROOF OF FACTS THAT ARE CONTESTED

Posted on April 24, 2018 by Neil Garfield

The entire playbook of the banks and servicers consists of one underlying theme: to obtain foreclosures based upon presumptions that are contrary to the facts.

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see Judicial Notice in Florida 90.202

and notice these provisions that are common to most if not all Judicial Notice statutes specifically state that judicial notice is ONLY for facts not subject to dispute.

Get up to speed on judicial notice. It is a ruse in the context of foreclosures and especially evictions or unlawful detainer actions filed after a supposed sale. They are seeking to avoid the requirement of proving that which they cannot prove unless the court not only accepts the document has having been judicially noticed but also that what is written on the document is presumptively true.

This is one place where the burden does not shift so easily. As I read the law, once you make the assertion contained in the document a question of fact, then the burden does not shift to you unless and until they introduce testimony (not legal argument) that is the foundation for introducing the document into evidence.   It seems crystal clear that they cannot do this because the facts point in an entirely different direction.

You might want to consider filing your own motion for summary judgment on the premise that if all they have is a plea for judicial notice and  they can’t otherwise prove the truth of the matters asserted in the documents submitted for judicial notice, then they have nothing and there are no issues of fact left to be tried, the burden does not shift to you, and judgment should be entered against the party seeking possession through eviction.

In your argument you should cite specific case law and statutes on judicial notice. Judicial notice is not meant to be a vehicle for skating around the truth. It is meant to streamline admission of evidence that comes from an independent third party with no interest in the outcome of litigation and is therefore presumptively true — because it is 100% credible.

First judicial notice is only good for proving the fact that the document exists. Second, what is written on the document is presumed true UNLESS you deny or object — so they must still prove that what is written on the document is true with other evidence. Third, judicial notice mostly applies to government generated documents — not self serving documents that are recorded or uploaded somewhere for the sole purpose of invoking judicial notice.

The entire reason why judicial notice exists is judicial economy — why require someone to prove something that everyone already knows is true or is contained in government agency files or website wherein the information is generated by an independent third party with no interest in the outcome of the litigation? Such documents are inherently credible.

They will try to say that they took title by virtue of the deed that was issued. The fact that they are seeking the court to admit into evidence as true is that the deed was valid. You contest that the deed was valid. Therefore it is up to them, apart from the deed, to show facts that the deed was valid and that means that the property was sold by a properly authorized trustee on behalf of an actual beneficiary who was either the obligee of the contested debt or the authorized agent for the obligee.

If the property was “sold” on behalf of a party who was not an obligee on the debt then it was sold by a non-beneficiary. And the filing of a substitution of trustee was void. And the “credit bid” was a false statement equivalent to perjury.

Filed under: burden of persuasion, burden of pleading, BURDEN OF PROOF, CORRUPTION, discovery, evidence, Fabrication of documents, foreclosure, Motions | Tagged: , , , , , | 2 Comments »

Breaking it Down: What to Say and Do in an Unlawful Detainer or Eviction

Posted on December 21, 2017 by Neil Garfield

Homeowners seem to have more options than they think in an unlawful detainer action based upon my analysis. It is the first time in a nonjudicial foreclosure where the foreclosing party is actually making assertions and representations against which the homeowner may defend. The deciding factor is what to do at trial. And the answer, as usual, is well-timed aggressive objections mostly based upon foundation and hearsay, together with a cross examination that really drills down.

Winning an unlawful detainer action in a nonjudicial foreclosure reveals the open sores contained within the false claims of securitization or transfer.

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HAT TIP TO DAN EDSTROM

Matters affecting the validity of the trust deed or primary obligation itself, or other basic defects in the plaintiffs title, are neither properly raised in this summary proceeding for possession, nor are they concluded by the judgment.” (Emphasis added.) (Cheney v. Trauzettel (1937) 9 Cal.2d 158, 159-160.) My emphasis added

So we can assume that they are specifically preserving your right to sue for damages. But also, if they still have the property you can sue to get it back. If you do that and file a lis pendens they can’t sell it again. If a third party purchaser made the bid or otherwise has “bought” the property you probably can’t touch the third party — unless you can show that said purchaser did in fact know that the sale was defective. Actual knowledge defeats the presumptions of facially valid instruments and recorded instruments.

The principal point behind all this is that the entire nonjudicial scheme and structure becomes unconstitutional if in either the wording of the statutes or the way the statutes are applied deprive the homeowner of due process. Denial of due process includes putting a burden on the homeowner that would not be there if the case was brought as a judicial foreclosure. I’m not sure if any case says exactly that but I am sure it is true and would be upheld if challenged.


It is true that where the purchaser at a trustee’s sale proceeds under section 1161a of the Code of Civil Procedure he must prove his acquisition of title by purchase at the sale; but it is only to this limited extent, as provided by the statute, that the title may be litigated in such a proceeding. Hewitt v. Justice’ Court, 131 Cal.App. 439, 21 P.(2d) 641; Nineteenth Realty Co. v. Diggs, 134 Cal.App. 278, 25 P.(2d) 522; Berkeley Guarantee Building & Loan Ass’n v. Cunnyngham, 218 Cal. 714, 24 P.(2d) 782. — [160] * * * In our opinion, the plaintiff need only prove a sale in compliance with the statute and deed of trust, followed by purchase at such sale, and the defendant may raise objections only on that phase of the issue of title

So the direct elements are laid out here and other objections to title are preserved (see above):

  • The existence of a sale under nonjudicial statutes
  • Acquisition of title by purchase at the sale
  • Compliance with statutes
  • Compliance with deed of trust

The implied elements and issues are therefore as follows:

  • Was it a Trustee who conducted the sale? (i.e., was the substitution of Trustee valid?) If not, then the party who conducted the sale was not a trustee and the “sale” was not a trustee sale. If Substitution of Trustee occurred as the result of the intervention of a party who was not a beneficiary, then no substitution occurred. Thus no right of possession arises. The objection is to lack of foundation. The facial validity of the instrument raises only a rebuttable presumption.
  • Was the “acquisition” of title the result of a purchase — i.e., did someone pay cash or did someone submit a credit bid? If someone paid cash then a sale could only have occurred if the “seller” (i.e., the trustee) had title. This again goes to the issue of whether the substitution of trustee was a valid appointment. A credit bid could only have been submitted by a beneficiary under the deed of trust as defined by applicable statutes. If the party claiming to be a beneficiary was only an intervenor with no real interest in the debt, then the “bid” was neither backed by cash nor a debt owed by the homeowner to the intervenor. According there was no valid sale under the applicable statutes. Thus such a party would have no right to possession. The objection is to lack of foundation. The facial validity of the instrument raises only a rebuttable presumption.

The object is to prevent the burden of proof from falling onto the homeowner. By challenging the existence of a sale and the existence of a valid trustee, the burden stays on the Plaintiff. Thus you avoid the presumption of facial validity by well timed and well placed objections.

” `To establish that he is a proper plaintiff, one who has purchased property at a trustee’s sale and seeks to evict the occupant in possession must show that he acquired the property at a regularly conducted sale and thereafter ‘duly perfected’ his title. [Citation.]’ (Vella v. Hudgins (1977) 20 Cal.3d 251,255, 142 Cal.Rptr. 414,572 P.2d 28; see Cruce v. Stein (1956) 146 Cal.App.2d 688,692,304 P.2d 118; Kelliherv. Kelliher(1950) 101 Cal.App.2d 226,232,225 P.2d 554; Higgins v. Coyne (1946) 75 Cal.App.2d 69, 73, 170 P2d 25; [*953] Nineteenth Realty Co. v. Diggs (1933) 134 Cal.App. 278, 288-289, 25 P2d 522.) One who subsequently purchases property from the party who bought it at a trustee’s sale may bring an action for unlawful detainer under subdivision (b)(3) of section 1161a. (Evans v. Superior Court (1977) 67 Cai.App.3d 162, 169, 136 Cal.Rptr. 596.) However, the subsequent purchaser must prove that the statutory requirements have been satisfied, i.e., that the sale was conducted in accordance with section 2924 of the Civil Code and that title under such sale was duly perfected. {Ibid.) ‘Title is duly perfected when all steps have been taken to make it perfect, i.e. to convey to the purchaser that which he has purchased, valid and good beyond all reasonable doubt (Hocking v. Title Ins. & Trust Co, (1951), 37 Cal.2d 644, 649 [234 P.2d 625,40 A.L.R.2d 1238] ), which includes good record title (Gwin v. Calegaris (1903), 139 Cal. 384 [73 P. 851] ), (Kessler v. Bridge (1958) 161 Cal.App.2d Supp. 837, 841, 327 P.2d 241.) ¶ To the limited extent provided by subdivision (b){3) of section 1161a, title to the property may be litigated in an unlawful detainer proceeding. (Cheney v. Trauzettel (1937) 9 Cal.2d 158, 159, 69 P.2d 832.) While an equitable attack on title is not permitted (Cheney, supra, 9 Cal.2d at p. 160, 69 P.2d 832), issues of law affecting the validity of the foreclosure sale or of title are properly litigated. (Seidel) v. Anglo-California Trust Co. (1942) 55 Cai.App.2d 913, 922, 132 P.2d 12, approved in Vella v. Hudgins, supra, 20 Cal.3d at p. 256, 142 Cal.Rptr. 414, 572 P.2d 28.)’ ” (Stephens, Partain & Cunningham v. Hollis (1987) 196 Cai.App.3d 948, 952-953.)
 
Here the court goes further in describing the elements. The assumption is that a trustee sale has occurred and that title has been perfected. If you let them prove that, they win.
  • acquisition of property
  • regularly conducted sale
  • duly perfecting title

The burden on the party seeking possession is to prove its case “beyond all reasonable doubt.” That is a high bar. If you raise real questions and issues in your objections, motion to strike testimony and exhibits etc. they would then be deemed to have failed to meet their burden of proof.

Don’t assume that those elements are present “but” you have a counterargument. The purpose of the law on this procedure to gain possession of property is to assure that anyone who follows the rules in a bona fide sale and acquisition will get POSSESSION. The rights of the homeowner to accuse the parties of fraud or anything else are eliminated in an action for possession. But you can challenge whether the sale actually occurred and whether the party who did it was in fact a trustee. 

There is also another factor which is whether the Trustee, if he is a Trustee, was acting in accordance with statutes and the general doctrine of acting in good faith. The alleged Trustee must be able to say that it was in fact the “new” beneficiary who executed the substitution of Trustee, or who gave instructions for issuing a Notice of Default and Notice of sale.

If the “successor” Trustee does not know whether the “successor” party is a beneficiary or not, then the foundation testimony and exhibits must come from someone who can establish beyond all reasonable doubt that the foreclosure proceeding emanated from a party who was in fact the owner of the debt and therefore the beneficiary under the deed of trust. 

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Filed under: burden of persuasion, BURDEN OF PROOF, Eviction, foreclosure, Trail Objections, Unlawful Detainer | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | 22 Comments »

Are Foreclosure Trustees Debt Collectors?

Posted on May 31, 2017 by Neil Garfield

Such rulings from appellate courts undermine confidence in the judicial system for those who are victims of wrongdoing and reinforce the confidence and arrogance of those committing the wrongs that they will get away with it.

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see 9th Circuit Foreclosure Trustee not a debt collector 10-56884

The entire “Substitution of Trustee” scheme is performed with two purposes only — (1) to record a self servicing document that will be considered facially valid establishing a “new” beneficiary and (2) the selection of an entity whose sole purpose is to facilitate foreclosure.

As a Trustee on a deed of trust it has obligations set forth in state statutes allowing the use of non-judicial foreclosure proceedings. The old beneficiary, frequently a title company, would follow the requirements of the statutes and common sense. The “new” one is “appointed” by a self-proclaimed beneficiary with instructions to foreclose. Hence the new trustee is obviously selected because of the likelihood that it will follow instructions from the self-proclaimed “successor” beneficiary and thus “establish” the validity of the new beneficiary and the data from the new beneficiary indicating the existence of a default. That is why it is described as “the foreclosure trustee.” The old one might require more information and documentation to establish the authenticity of the successor beneficiary.

The 9th Circuit here amending its prior opinion, rules out the foreclosure trustee as a debt collector because it is only selling collateral and not seeking recovery of money. Never mind the default letter that gives the amounts required for reinstatement or the redemption rights of any borrower. Playing right into the hands of the banks, the 9th Circuit has simply failed to deal with realities and instead has arrived at a result that this is as remote from the realities of today’s foreclosures as any Dickensian portrayal of the courts (see “Bleakhouse“).

The dissenting opinion from which I quote below sums up the weakness of this decision:

The suggestion in Hulse that a foreclosure proceeding is one in which “the lender is foreclosing its interest in the property” is flatly wrong. A foreclosure proceeding is one in which the interest of the debtor (and not the creditor) is foreclosed in a proceeding conducted by a trustee who holds title to the property and who then uses the proceeds to retire all or part of the debt owed by the borrower. See Cal. Civ. Code § 2931; Yvanova v. New Century Mortg. Corp., 365 P.3d 845, 850 (Cal. 2016). Any excess funds raised over the amount owed by the borrower (and costs associated with the foreclosure) are paid to the borrower. See Cal. Civ. Code § 2924k; see also Jesse Dukeminier & James E. Krier, Property 590 (2d ed. 1988). Thus, contrary to the holding in Hulse, “[t]here can be no serious doubt that the ultimate purpose of foreclosure is the payment of money.” Glazer, 704 F.3d at 463. Nor, because the FDCPA defines a “debt collector” as one who collects or attempts to collect, “directly or indirectly,” debts owed to another, 15 U.S.C. § 1692a(6), does it matter that the money collected at a foreclosure sale does not come directly from the debtor.

But even this fairly clear rendition of foreclosures recites “facts” that are in an alternate universe, to wit: that “the money collected at a foreclosure sale does not come directly from the debtor.” Where else did it come from? It came from the sale of the alleged debtor’s homestead which is property owned by the debtor and which can only be stopped by payment of the amount demanded or a lawsuit challenging the Substitution of Trustee, the status of the supposed successor beneficiary and the presence of a default between the homeowner, on the one hand, and the new beneficiary on the other hand. Either way the money comes from the debtor.

Add to that the obvious fact that Recontrust and other entities similarly situated are simply controlled entities of the large banks. In a word, they are appointing themselves as beneficiary and as successor trustee through the use of a sham entity that has no interest nor any power to act like a true trustee. The analytical issue appears to be that taken collectively, the Foreclosure Trustee, the self proclaimed successor beneficiary and the self proclaimed or appointed “servicer” are aiming for foreclosure under the guise of a quest for money.

Filed under: foreclosure | Tagged: , , , , | 7 Comments »

Now You See Them, Now You Don’t

Posted on September 6, 2016 by Neil Garfield

ARE LAW FIRMS CROSSING THE LINE FOR BANKS WHO WILL THROW THEM UNDER THE BUS?

It is a chaotic circular round of documents emanating ultimately by, for and from the same parties. And somehow it is becoming custom and practice to allow law firm employees to sign important documents that transfer possession, delivery, ownership and servicing rights from one party to another while those parties themselves sign nothing.

THE FOLLOWING ARTICLE IS NOT A LEGAL OPINION UPON WHICH YOU CAN RELY IN ANY INDIVIDUAL CASE. HIRE A LAWYER.

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I can’t help thinking about whether there is a motion in California and other nonjudicial states that allows you to challenge the right of the attorney to be the attorney of record when the law firm is a fact witness on issues that are central to the case. Having signed the proof of claim, being the trustee (who supposedly represents the party who signs a proof of claim), etc., the question is whether they are acting on their own behalf or on behalf of a third party who might indeed have some objections against the law firm representing the interests of parties whose interests might be antithetical to their own.

In a deed of trust you have the trustor (homeowner) and the Trustee in the middle between the trustor and the beneficiary who presumably is the creditor. By now we know that original beneficiary probably did not make the loan and that the alleged new beneficiary didn’t buy it. The beneficiaries’ claims are only as good as the words on the fabricated paper on which they are written and certain legal presumptions that are routinely misapplied.

So the first sign of trouble is the “Substitution of Trustee” wherein a “New” beneficiary executes a document appointing a new Trustee on the Deed of Trust. Why? What was wrong with the old one if everything was on the up and up? They substitute because they know the original Trustee won’t accept the instructions from the new party because the original Trustee has no objective reason to believe that the new “party” is a “beneficiary”. Who signs that “substitution of Trustee”?

It is usually someone who has been given instructions to sign it on the promise and premise that they have been appointed attorney in fact for the “new beneficiary.” In fact, in many cases their only job is signing documents that they have received instructions to sign. But the actual person signing knows absolutely nothing about the deal and has no knowledge about the facts behind the business of signing such documents — assuming their signature was not forged or robo-signed.

So in this and many if not nearly all cases, the actual signature is supplied by a third party who will then fabricate a power of attorney to do it — still without any facts about why the Trustee needs to be replaced. In most cases it is an employee of the law firm who by definition (?) has no actual interest in the loan, the debt, the note or the mortgage (Deed of Trust). This makes the person who signed it a fact witness and watch how the law firm fights to prevent that person from testifying at deposition or trial. In many cases they will assert that the person is no longer employed and they don’t know where he or she is now located.

And then you have the new Trustee who often turns out to be the same law firm who signed the Substitution of Trustee, making it a double self-serving document for which no legal presumptions should apply since there is no foundation in evidence that establishes the law firm as a real party in interest — and if such evidence existed the law firm would be disqualified from representing the allegedly new beneficiary and from being the Trustee AND advocate against the Trustor. If the legislature meant to allow that sort of thing they would have been violating the due process clause of the U.S. Constitution making the entire nonjudicial statutory scheme unconstitutional.

Who signs the power of attorney once it is fabricated? It is either the law firm employee or an employee who works for a “servicer” who in most cases is not named in any document as servicer. Who signs the validation of the foreclosure? Same person. It is a chaotic circular round of documents emanating ultimately by, for and from the same parties. And somehow it is becoming custom and practice to allow law firm employees to sign important documents that transfer possession, delivery, ownership and servicing rights from one party to another while those parties themselves sign nothing.

That is what they are talking about when they refer to “remote” vehicles. It is a situation where actions are taken and the people for whom the action was taken cannot be tied into the transaction in case someone needs to go to jail, or pay a fine or sanctions. But somehow the Courts have twisted this into meaning that what is good for the goose is not good for the gander. The banks can distance themselves from liability for a fabricated transaction but they also can receive the benefits of the fabrication as though they were present.

https://www.vcita.com/v/lendinglies to schedule CONSULT, leave message or make payments.

Filed under: foreclosure | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments »

NEW LOAN CLOSINGS — BEWARE!!!— NonJudicial Deeds of Trust Slipped into New Mortgage Closings in Judicial States

Posted on December 29, 2014 by Neil Garfield

For more information please call 520-405-1688 or 954-495-9867

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IF YOU ARE HAVING A CLOSING ON A REFI OR NEW LOAN BEWARE OF WHAT DOCUMENTS ARE BEING USED THAT WAIVE YOUR RIGHTS TO CONTEST WRONGFUL FORECLOSURES — GET A LAWYER!!!

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EDITOR’S NOTE: It is no secret that the Bank’s have a MUCH easier time foreclosing on property in states that have set up non-judicial foreclosure. Banks like Bank of America set up their own “Substitute Trustee” (“RECONTRUST”) — the first filing before the foreclosure commences. In this “Substitution of Trustee” Bank of America declares itself to be the new beneficiary or acting on behalf of the new beneficiary without any court or agency verification of that claim. So in essence BOA is naming itself as both the new beneficiary (mortgagee) and the “Trustee” which is the only protection that the homeowner (“Trustor”). This is a blatant violation of the intent of the the laws of any state allowing nonjudicial foreclosure.
The Trustee is supposed to serve as the objective intermediary between the borrower and the lender. Where a non-lender issues a self serving statement that it is the beneficiary and the the borrower contests the “Substitution of Trustee” the OLD trustee is, in my opinion, obligated to file an interpleader action stating that it has competing claims, it has no interest in the outcome and it wants attorneys fees and costs. That leaves the new “beneficiary” and the borrower to fight it out under the requirements of due process. An Immediate TRO (Temporary Restraining Order) should be issued against the “new” Trustee and the “new” beneficiary from taking any further action in foreclosure when the borrower denies that the substitution of trustee was a valid instrument (based in part on the fact that the “beneficiary” who appointed the “substitute trustee” is not the true beneficiary. This SHOULD require the Bank to prove up its case in the old style, but it is often misapplied in procedure putting the burden on the borrower to prove facts that only the bank has in its care, custody and control. And THAT is where very aggressive litigation to obtain discovery is so important.
If the purpose of the legislation was to allow a foreclosing party to succeed in foreclosure when it could not succeed in a judicial proceeding, then the provision would be struck down as an unconstitutional deprivation of due process and other civil rights. But the rationale of each of the majority states that have adopted this infrastructure was to create a clerical system for what had been a clerical function for decades — where most foreclosures were uncontested and the use of Judges, Clerks of the Court and other parts of the judicial system was basically a waste of time. And practically everyone agreed.
There are two developments to report on this. First the U.S. Supreme Court turned down an appeal from Bank of America who was using Recontrust in Utah foreclosures and was asserting that Texas law must be used to enforce Utah foreclosures because Texas was allegedly the headquarters of Recontrust. So what they were trying to do, and failed, was to apply the highly restrictive laws of Texas with a tiny window of opportunity to contest the foreclosure in the State of Utah that had laws that protected consumers far better than Texas. The Texas courts refused to apply that doctrine and the U.S. Supreme court refused to even hear it. see WATCH OUT! THE BANKS ARE STILL COMING!
But a more sinister version of the shell game is being played out in new closings across the country — borrowers are being given a “Deed of Trust” instead of a mortgage in judicial states in order to circumvent the laws of that state. By fiat the banks are creating a “contract” in which the borrower agrees that if the “beneficiary” tells the Trustee on the deed of trust that the borrower did not pay, the borrower has already agreed by contract to allow the forced sale of the property. See article below. As usual borrowers are told NOT to hire an attorney for closing because “he can’t change anything anyway.” Not true. And the Borrower’s ignorance of the difference between a mortgage and a deed of trust is once again being used against the homeowners in ways that are undetected until long after the statute of limitations has apparently run out on making a claim against the loan originator.
THIS IS A CLEAR VIOLATION OF STATE LAW IN MOST JUDICIAL STATES — WHICH THE BANKS ARE TRYING TO OVERTURN BY FORCING OR TRICKING BORROWERS INTO SIGNING “AGREEMENTS” TO ALLOW FORCED SALE WITHOUT THE BANK EVER PROVING THEIR CASE AS TO THE DEBT, OWNERSHIP AND BALANCE. Translation: “It’s OK to wrongfully foreclose on me.”
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Foreclosure News: Who Gets to Decide Whether a State is a Judicial Foreclosure State or a Non-Judicial Foreclosure State, Legislatures or the Mortgage Industry?

posted by Nathalie Martin
Apparently some mortgage lenders feel they can make this change unilaterally. Big changes are afoot in the process of granting a home mortgage, which could have a significant impact on a homeowner’s ability to fight foreclosure. In many states in the Unites States (including but not limited to Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Vermont and Wisconsin), a lender must go to court and give the borrower a certain amount of notice before foreclosing on his or her home. Now the mortgage industry is quickly and quietly trying to change this, hoping no one will notice. The goal seems to be to avoid those annoying court processes and go right for the home without foreclosure procedures. This change is being attempted by some lenders simply by asking borrowers to sign deeds of trust rather than mortgages from now on.
Not long ago, Karen Myers, the head of the Consumer Protection Division of the New Mexico Attorney General’s Office, started noticing that some consumers were being given deeds of trust to sign rather than mortgages when obtaining a home loan. She wondered why this was being done and also how this change would affect consumers’ rights in foreclosure. When she asked lenders how this change in the instrument being signed would affect a consumer’s legal rights, she was told that the practice of having consumers sign deeds of trust rather than mortgages would not affect consumers’ rights in foreclosure at all. Being skeptical, she and others in her division dug further into this newfound practice to see if it was widespread or just a rare occurrence in the world of mortgage lending. Sure enough, mortgages had all but disappeared, being replaced with a deed of trust.
As a general matter, depending on the law in a state, a deed of trust can be foreclosed without a court’s involvement or any oversight at all. More specifically, the differences between judicial and non-judicial foreclosures are explained here in the four page document generated by the Mortgage Bankers’ Association. It is not totally clear whether this change will affect the legal rights of borrowers in all judicial foreclosure states, but AGs around the country should start looking into this question. Lenders here in New Mexico insist that this change in practice will not affect substantive rights but if not, why the change? The legal framework is vague and described briefly here.
Eleven lenders in New Mexico have been notified by the AG’s Office to stop marketing products as mortgages when, in fact, they are deeds of trust, according to Meyers and fellow Assistant Attorney General David Kramer. As a letter to lenders says: “It is apparent … that the wholesale use of deeds of trusts in lieu of mortgage instruments to secure home loans is intended to modify and abrogate the protections afforded a homeowner by the judicial foreclosure process and the [New Mexico] Home Loan Protection Act.”

Filed under: foreclosure | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | 21 Comments »

Here it is: Nonjudicial Foreclosure Violates Due Process in Complex Structured Finance Transactions

Posted on February 21, 2014 by Neil Garfield

No, there isn’t a case yet. But here is my argument.

The main point is that we are forced to accept the burden of disproving a case that had not been filed — the very essence of nonjudicial foreclosure. In order to comply with due process, a simple denial of the facts and legal authority to foreclosure should be sufficient to force the case into a courtroom where the parties are realigned with the so-called new beneficiary is the Plaintiff and the homeowner is the Defendant — since it is the “beneficiary” who is seeking affirmative relief.

But the way it is done and required to be done, the Plaintiff must file an attack on a case that has never been alleged anywhere in or out of court. The new beneficiary anoints itself, files a fraudulent substitution of trustee because the old one would never go along with it, and then files a notice of default and notice of sale all on the premise that they have the necessary proof and documents to support what could have been an action in foreclosure brought by them in a judicial manner, for which there is adequate provision in California law.

Instead nonjudicial foreclosure is being used to sell property under circumstances where the alleged beneficiary under the deed of trust could never prevail in a court proceeding. Nonjudicial foreclosure was meant to be an expedient method of dealing with the vast majority of foreclosures when the statute was passed. In that vast majority, the usual procedure was complaint, default, judgment and then sale with at least one hearing in between. Nearly all foreclosures were resolved that way and it become more of a ministerial act for Judges than an actual trier of fact or judge of procedural rights and wrongs.

But the situation is changed. The corruption on Wall Street has been systemic resulting in whole sale fraudulent fabricated forged documents together with perjury by affidavit and even live testimony. Contrary to the consensus supported by the banks, these cases are complex because the party seeking affirmative relief — i.e., the new “beneficiary” is following a complex script established long before the homeowner ever applied for a loan or was solicited to finance her property.

The San Francisco study concluded, like dozens of other studies across the country that most of the foreclosures were resolved in favor of “strangers to the transaction.” By definition, the use of several layers of companies and multiple sets of documents defining two separate deals (one with the investor lenders and one with the borrower, with the only party in common being the broker dealer selling mortgage bonds and their controlled entities) has turned the mundane into highly complex litigation that has no venue. In non-judicial foreclosures the Trustee is the party who acts to sell the property under instructions from the beneficiary and does so without inquiry and without paying any attention to the obvious conflict between the title record, the securitization record, the homeowner’s position and the prior record owner of the loan.

The Trustee has no power to conduct a hearing, administrative or judicial, and so the dispute remains unresolved while the Trustee proceeds to sell the property knowing that the homeowner has raised objections. Under normal circumstances under existing common law and statutory authority, the Trustee would simply bring the matter to court in an action for interpleader saying there is a dispute that he doesn’t have the power to resolve. You might think this would clog the court system. That is not the case, although some effort by the banks would be made to do just that. Under existing common law and statutory law, the beneficiary would then need to file a complaint, verified, sworn with real exhibits and that are subject to real scrutiny before any burden of proof would shift to the homeowner. And as complex as these transactions are they all are subject to simple rules concerning financial transactions. If there was no money in the alleged transaction then the allegation of a transaction is false.

It was and remains a mistake to allow such loans to be foreclosed through any means other than strictly judicial where the “beneficiary” must allege and prove ownership and the balance due on the loan owed to THAT beneficiary. Requiring homeowners with zero sophistication in finance and litigation to bear the initial burden of proof in such highly complex structured finance schemes defies logic and common sense as well as being violative of due process in the application of the nonjudicial statutes to these allegedly securitized loans.

By forcing the parties and judges who sit on the bench to treat these complex issues as though they were simple cases, the enabling statutes for nonjudicial foreclosure are being applied unconstitutionally.

Filed under: CORRUPTION, education, escrow agent, Eviction, evidence, expert witness, Fannie MAe, foreclosure, foreclosure defenses, foreclosure mill, GARFIELD KELLEY AND WHITE, GTC | Honor, investment banking, Investor, MBS TRUSTEE, MODIFICATION, Mortgage, Pleading, securities fraud, Servicer, STATUTES, TRUST BENEFICIARIES, trustee | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | 266 Comments »

Deny and Discover Strategy Working

Posted on September 20, 2012 by Neil Garfield

For representation in South Florida, where I am both licensed and familiar with the courts and Judges, call 520-405-1688. If you live in another state we provide direct support to attorneys. call the same number.

Having watched botched cases work their way to losing conclusions and knowing there is a better way, I have been getting more involved in individual cases — pleading, memos, motions, strategies and tactics — and we are already seeing some good results. Getting into discovery levels the playing field and forces the other side to put up or shut up. Since they can’t put up, they must shut up.

If you start with the premise that the original mortgage was defective for the primary reason that it was unfunded by the payee on the note, the party identified as “Lender” or the mortgagee or beneficiary, we are denying the transaction, denying the signature where possible (or pleading that the signature was procured by fraud), and thus denying that any “transfer” afterwards could not have conveyed any more than what the “originator” had, which is nothing.

This is not a new concept. Investors are suing the investment banks saying exactly what we have been saying on these pages — that the origination process was fatally defective, the notes and mortgages unenforceable and the predatory lending practices lowering the value of even being a “lender.”

We’ve see hostile judges turn on the banks and rule for the homeowner thus getting past motions to lift stay, motions to dismiss and motions for summary judgment in the last week.

The best line we have been using is “Judge, if you were lending the money wouldn’t you want YOUR name on the note and mortgage?” Getting the wire transfer instructions often is the kiss of death for the banks because the originator of the wire transfer is not the payee and the instructions do not say that this is for benefit of the “originator.”

As far as I can tell there is no legal definition of “originator.” It is one step DOWN from mortgage broker whose name should also not be on the note or mortgage. An originator is a salesman, and if you look behind the scenes at SEC filings or other regulatory filings you will see your “lender” identified not as a lender, which is what they told you, but as an originator. That means they were a placeholder or nominee just like the MERS situation.

TILA and Regulation Z make it clear that even if there was nexus of connection between the source of funds and the originator, it would till be an improper predatory table-funded loan where the borrower was denied the disclosure and information to know and choose the source of a loan, thus enabling consumers to shop around.

In order of importance, we are demanding through subpoena duces tecum, that parties involved in the fake securitization chain come for examination of the wire transfer, check, ACH or other money transfer showing the original funding of the loan and any other money transactions in which the loan was involved INCLUDING but not limited to transactions with or for the fake pool of mortgages that seems to always be empty with no bank account, no trustee account, and no actual trustee with any powers. These transactions don’t exist. The red herring is that the money showed up at closing which led everyone to the mistaken conclusion that the originator made the loan.

Second we ask for the accounting records showing the establishment on the books and records of the originator, and any assignees, of a loan receivable together with the name and address of the bookkeeper and the auditing firm for that entity. No such entries exist because the loan receivable was converted into a bond receivable, but he bond was worthless because it was based on an empty pool.

And third we ask for the documentation, correspondence and all other communications between the originator and the closing agent and between each “assignor” and “assignee” which, as we have seen they are only too happy to fabricate and produce. But the documentation is NOT supported by underlying transactions where money exchanged hands.

The net goals are to attack the mortgage as not having been perfected because the transaction was and remains incomplete as recited in the note, mortgage and other “closing” documents. The “lender” never fulfilled their part of the bargain — loaning the money. Hence the mortgage secures an obligation that does not exist. The note is then attacked as being fatally defective partly because the names were used as nominees leaving the borrower with nobody to talk to about the loan status — there being a nominee payee, nominee lender, and nominee mortgagee or beneficiary.

The other part, just as serious is that the terms of repayment on the note do NOT match up to the terms agreed upon with the institutional investors that purchased mortgage bonds to which the borrower was NOT a party and did not issue. Hence the basic tenets of contract law — offer, acceptance and consideration are all missing.

The Deny and Discover strategy is better because it attacks the root of the transaction and enables the borrower to deny everything the forecloser is trying to put over on the Court with the appearance of reality but nothing to back it up.

The attacks on the foreclosers based upon faulty or fraudulent or even forged documentation make for interesting reading but if in the final analysis the borrower is admitting the loan, admitting the note and mortgage, admitting the default then all the other stuff leads a Judge to conclude that there is error in the ways of the banks but no harm because they were entitled to foreclose anyway.

People are getting on board with this strategy and they have the support from an unlikely source — the investors who thought they were purchasing mortgage bonds with value instead of a sham bond based upon an empty pool with no money and no assets and no loans. Their allegation of damages is based upon the fact that despite the provisions of the pooling and servicing agreement, the prospectus and their reasonable expectations, that the closings were defective, the underwriting was defective and that there is no way to legally enforce the notes and mortgages, notwithstanding the fact that so many foreclosures have been allowed to proceed.

Call 520-405-1688 for customer service and you will get guidance on how to get help.

  1. Do we agree that creditors should be paid only once?
  2. Do we agree that pretending to borrow money for mortgages sand then using it at the race track is wrong?
  3. Do we agree that if the lender and the borrower sign two different documents each containing different terms, they don’t have a deal?
  4. Can we agree that if you were lending money you would want your name on the note and mortgage and not someone else’s?
  5. Can we agree that banks who loaned nothing and bought nothing should be worth nothing when the chips are counted in mortgage assets?

 

Filed under: bubble, CDO, CORRUPTION, currency, Eviction, foreclosure, GTC | Honor, Investor, Mortgage, securities fraud | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 39 Comments »

MERS: No Agency with Undisclosed Rotating “Principals”

Posted on August 17, 2012 by Neil Garfield

THE WASHINGTON SUPREME COURT DECISION WILL BE USED EXTENSIVELY AT THE EMERYVILLE AND ANAHEIM CLE WORKSHOPS.

The Stunning clarity of the decision rendered by the Washington Supreme Court, sitting En Banc, corroborates the statements I have made on this blog and under oath that they might just as well have put the name “Donald Duck” in as the mortgagee or beneficiary.

The argument, previously successful, has been that even if the entity MERS had nothing to do with financial transaction and even if they didn’t know about the transaction because the “knowledge” was all contained on a database that nobody at MERS checked for authenticity or veracity, the instrument was still valid. This coupled with a “public policy”argument that if the courts were to rule otherwise none of the MERS “mortgages” would be valid thus making the creditor unsecured.

The Washington Supreme court rejected that argument and further added that if such was the result, then it was through no fault of the borrower. SO now we have a situation where the law in the State of Washington is that MERS beneficiary instruments do not establish a perfected lien and therefore there is no opportunity to foreclose using either non-judicial or judicial means. A word of caution here is that this applies right now as law only in that state but that it closely follows the Landmark decision in Kansas Supreme Court. But the decision is extremely persuasive and reinvigorates the fight over whether the loans were secured loans or unsecured — especially powerful in bankruptcy courts.

It should be noted that the Washington Supreme Court has wider application than might appear at first blush. This is because the question was certified not from a state judge but from a federal court. Thus in Federal Courts, the decision might be all the more persuasive that MERS, which never had anything to do with the financial transaction, never handled a dime of the money going in or out of the loan receivable account, and never had any person with personal knowledge who could identify and verify that there was a disclosed principal for whom they were acting should be identified as a non-stakeholder with bare (naked) title recited in a fatally defective instrument.

This does not mean the obligation vanishes. It just means that they can’t foreclose through non-judicial foreclosure and probably can’t foreclose even through judicial means unless they accompany it with a request that the court reconstruct the mortgage — in which case they would need to allege and prove that the disclosed parties were the sources of funds for the origination of the loans, which in most cases, they were not.

The actual parties who were the source of funds either still exist or have been settled or traded out into new investment vehicles. This is why putting intense pressure to move the discovery along is so powerful. You are demanding what they should have had when they started the foreclosure timeline with a defective notice of default signed by a person who had no idea what the loan receivable account looked like or even the identity of the party or entity that had the loan booked as a loan receivable.

You’ll remember that MERS issued a proclamation to everyone that nobody should use its name in foreclosures in 2011. But that doesn’t address the underlying fatal defect of the MERS business model and the instruments that recite MERS as the mortgagee or beneficiary.

Th reasoning behind the rejection of the “Agency” argument is also very important. The court states that “While we have no reason to doubt that the lendersand their assigns control MERS, agency requires a specific principal that is accountable for the acts of its agent. If MERS is an agent, its principals in the two cases before us remain unidentified.12 MERS attempts to sidestep this portion of traditional agency law by pointing to the language in the deeds of trust that describe MERS as “acting solely as a nominee for Lender and Lender’s successors and assigns.” Doc. 131-2, at 2 (Bain deed of trust); Doc. 9-1, at 3 (Selkowitz deed of trust.); e.g., Resp. Br. of MERS at 30 (Bain). But MERS offers no authority for the implicit proposition that the lender’s nomination of MERS as a nominee rises to an agency relationship with successor noteholders.13 MERS fails to identify the entities that control and are accountable for its actions. It has not established that it is an agent for a lawful principal.” Hat tip again to Yves Smith on picking up on that before I did.

And the court even went further than that on the issue of modification that I have been pounding on for so long — how can you submit a request for modification with a proposal unless you know the identity of the secured party and the identity of any party or stakeholder who is unsecured? Hoe can anyone settle or modify a claim without knowing the identity of the claimant or the actual status of the claim as affected by payments of co-obligors? “While not before us, we note that this is the nub of this and similar litigation and has caused great concern about possible errors in foreclosures, misrepresentation, and fraud. Under the MERS system, questions of authority and accountability arise, and determining who has authority to negotiate loan modifications and who is accountable for misrepresentation and fraud becomes extraordinarily difficult.”

BUT WAIT! THERE IS MORE! The famed Deutsch bank acting as trustee ruse is also exposed by the court, leaving doubt ( a question of material fact that is in dispute) as to the identity and character of the creditor and the status of the loan. Without those nobody can state with personal knowledge that the principal due is now this figure or that and that the following fees apply. The Supreme Court in the footnotes takes this on too, although it wasn’t argued (but will be in the future I can assure you): “It appears Deutsche Bank is acting as trustee of a trust that contains Bain’s note, along with many others, though the record does not establish what trust this might be.”

The Court also is not shy. It also takes on the notion that the borrower is not entitled to know the identity of the creditor or principal and that the borrower only has a right to know the identity of the servicer. This of course is patently absurd argument. If it were true anyone could assert they were the servicer and you could not look behind that assertion to determine its veracity.

“MERS insists that borrowers need only know the identity of the servicers of their loans. However, there is considerable reason to believe that servicers will not or are not in a position to negotiate loan modifications or respond to similar requests. See generally Diane E. Thompson, Foreclosing Modifications: How Servicer Incentives Discourage Loan Modifications, 86 Wash. L. Rev. 755 (2011); Dale A. Whitman, How Negotiability Has Fouled Up the Secondary Mortgage Market, and What To Do About It, 37 Pepp. L. Rev. 737, 757-58 (2010). Lack of transparency causes other problems. See generally U.S. Bank Nat’l Ass’n v. Ibanez, 458 Mass. 637, 941 N.E.2d 40 (2011) (noting difficulties in tracing ownership of the note).”

And lastly, about making the rules up as you along, and moving the goal posts around, the Court challenges the argument and rejects the MERS position that the parties are free to contract as they choose despite any statutory language. Specifically the question what is what is the definition of a beneficiary. In Washington as in other states, the definitions of the Act apply to all transactions described and there is no room for anyone to change the law by contract. “Despite its ubiquity, we have found no case—and MERS draws our attention to none—where this common statutory phrase has been read to mean that the parties can alter statutory provisions by contract, as opposed to the act itself suggesting a different definition might be appropriate for a specific statutory provision.”

And again corroborating my work and manuals on the livinglies store. the Court finally addresses for the first time that I am aware, the essential reason why all this is so important. It is the auction itself and the acceptance of the credit bid from a non-creditor. Besides the challenges as to whether the substitution of trustee and instructions to trustee are valid, nobody can claim title suddenly born as a result of a “transfer” or assignment” or other document from MERS, an entity that had specifically claimed any interest in the obligation. The Court concludes that you either have the proof of being the actual creditor to whom the obligation is owed, in which case you can submit a credit bid if it is properly secured, or you must pay cash.

“Other portions of the deed of trust act bolster the conclusion that the legislature meant to define “beneficiary” to mean the actual holder of the promissory note or other debt instrument. In the same 1998 bill that defined “beneficiary” for the first time, the legislature amended RCW 61.24.070 (which had previously forbidden the trustee alone from bidding at a trustee sale) to provide:
(1) The trustee may not bid at the trustee’s sale. Any other person, including the beneficiary, may bid at the trustee’s sale.
(2) The trustee shall, at the request of the beneficiary, credit toward the beneficiary’s bid all or any part of the monetary obligations secured by the deed of trust. If the beneficiary is the purchaser, any amount bid by the beneficiary in excess of the amount so credited shall
18
Bain (Kristin), et al. v. Mortg. Elec. Registration Sys., et al., No. 86206-1
be paid to the trustee in the form of cash, certified check, cashier’s check, money order, or funds received by verified electronic transfer, or any combination thereof. If the purchaser is not the beneficiary, the entire bid shall be paid to the trustee in the form of cash, certified check, cashier’s check, money order, or funds received by verified electronic transfer, or any combination thereof. Laws of 1998, ch. 295, § 9, codified as RCW 61.24.070. As Bain notes, this provision makes little sense if the beneficiary does not hold the note.”

Thus this court has now left open the possibility of challenging wrongful foreclosures both in equity and at law for damages (slander of title etc.) It would be hard to believe that Washington State Attorneys won’t pounce on this opportunity to do some good for their clients and themselves.

Filed under: bubble, CDO, CORRUPTION, currency, Eviction, foreclosure, GTC | Honor, Investor, Mortgage, securities fraud | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 21 Comments »

Blomberg Celebrates New Revised Hogan

Posted on July 17, 2012 by Neil Garfield

Featured Products and Services by The Garfield Firm

——–>SEE TABLE OF CONTENTS: WHOSE LIEN IS IT ANYWAY TOC

LivingLies Membership – If you are not already a member, this is the time to do it, when things are changing.
For Customer Service call 1-520-405-1688 

Darrell Blomberg is a presenter at our kickoff of the national tour of seminars starting July 26, 2012 in Chandler, AZ. He is NOT a lawyer but in my opinion has a better understanding of the law, its application and the context of the fake securitized loans than practically any else I know. He is completely correct in his analysis of the Hogan decision below.

I strongly advise homeowners who are near the Chandler location, to go find a lawyer and or contact the one they already have and PAY for the lawyer to attend the seminar and maybe pay for their own attendance as well. Paralegal add-ons are available as well.

Editor’s Note:

Darrell is 100% right that this decision poses a mammoth shadow problem for those people who are working for “Trustees” and conducting sales, sending notices of default and sending notices of sale. Issuing a deed on foreclosure to a party who who was the creditor but submitted a credit bid instead of a cash bid is only one issue. The fact is that if the Trustee becomes aware of a bona fide dispute between the alleged beneficiary or creditor and the borrower the Trustee has only ONE CHOICE: They must petition the court for a ruling because the Trustee does not have the power to conduct hearings. It IS that simple.

The reason they are not doing that and the reason why there is a substitution of trustee filed in every case is that the original trustee WOULD do that and would conduct due diligence, which the banks cannot afford because they know they don’t have the goods — they are not the creditor and in many cases even the the real original creditor is no longer present because of the trading activity and recompilation of the pools with different assets, loans and even using other derivatives as assets. 

These facts will all come out when the burden is put on the supposed creditor to show the transaction in which they paid real money for the loan. No such transaction exists. So they cannot submit a credit bid and probably don’t have the authority to initiate foreclosure proceedings. The potential liability of the Trustees that were substituted and perhaps even the original trustees is staggering when applied to prior foreclosures. When it becomes clear that the new trustee is appointed by a stranger to the transaction calling itself the beneficiary when it is not the beneficiary and new trustee is owned or controlled by the new “beneficiary.”

By Darrell Blomberg, July 11, 2012:

The Supreme Court of Arizona released their amended opinion this morning.  I have attached it for you or here is the link:  http://www.azcourts.gov/Portals/0/OpinionFiles/Supreme/2012/CV110115PR.pdf.  The essential changes were confined to section 11.

First off, I offer HUGE KUDOS and THANKS to all the extraordinary people who contributed to the effort of getting this all the way to the Supremes and then back into their court for a well-earned reconsideration.

The challenge with Hogan was that the questions were never optimally framed and Hogan didn’t make the record with sufficient allegations and assertions.  His pleadings left too many escape hatches open.  (No slight to anybody; the questions didn’t appear until long after the best-for-the-day questions were put forth.)  I’m amazed at “amount” of decision we got from the Supremes considering those challenges.

I believe the new “Moreover, the trustee owes the trustor a duty to comply with the obligations created by the statutes governing trustee sales and the trust deed.” language is very beneficial to homeowners and attorneys.  I think this is vastly better than the prior decision and gives us a lot more umph.  This is a clear statement of the court tying “duty” together with “statutes governing trustee’s sales and the trust deed.”  I can’t remember something so elemental and so important happening for us at any administrative, judicial or legislative level.  Tying duty to the statutes and contract was always sketchy but this decision does it succinctly and boldly.

This is precisely what all of my “Cancellation Demand Letters” have been geared to convey.  This decision will certainly be added to every “Cancellation Demand Letter” from now on.

Don’t forget this amended language:”A.R.S. § 33-801(10) (providing that “[t]he trustee’s obligations . . . are as specified in this chapter [and] in the trust deed”).”  It’s sure to be used against our efforts.  I think this can be well mitigated by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau bulletin 2012-03 which tied the servicer (beneficiary?) and the sub-servicer (trustee?) together for liability purposes.  Perhaps it doesn’t reign in the trustees so much but it sure raises the temperature on the beneficiary.  With the right amount of pressure on the beneficiary maybe they’ll heat up the trustee for us.  (See attached or this link: http://files.consumerfinance.gov/f/201204_cfpb_bulletin_service-providers.pdf)

For the record, here is the language that was removed from the original opinion: “Moreover, the trustee owes the trustor a fiduciary duty, and may be held liable for conducting a trustee’s sale when the trustor is not in default.”

My commercial:  If you know anybody that is in need of an all-out analysis of the Arizona Trustee’s Sale process that I turn into a letter for the homeowner, please let me know.  My letters are a great way to make the record and maybe even cancel a few notices of trustee’s sales along the way.  (Contact info is below.)

For further consideration, here is Black’s 6th on “Duty.”

Duty. A human action which is exactly conformable to the laws which require us to obey them. Legal or moral obligation. An obligation that one has by law or con­tract. Obligation to conform to legal standard of reason­able conduct in light of apparent risk. Karrar v. Barry County Road Com’n, 127 Mich.App. 821, 339 N.W.2d 653, 657. Obligatory conduct or service. Mandatory obligation to perform. Huey v. King, 220 Tenn. 189, 415 S.W.2d 136. An obligation, recognized by the law, re­quiring actor to conform to certain standard of conduct for protection of others against unreasonable risks. Samson v. Saginaw Professional Bldg., Inc., 44 Mich. App. 658, 205 N.W.2d 833, 835. See also Legal duty;Obligation.

Those obligations of performance, care, or observance which rest upon a person in an official or fiduciary capacity; as the duty of an executor, trustee, manager, etc.

In negligence cases term may be defined as an obli­gation, to which law will give recognition and effect, to comport to a particular standard of conduct toward another, and the duty is invariably the same, one must conform to legal standard of reasonable conduct in light of apparent risk. Merluzzi v. Larson, 96 Nev. 409, 610 P.2d 739, 741. The word”duty” is used throughout the Restatement of Torts to denote the fact that the actor is required to conduct himself in a particular manner at the risk that if he does not do so he becomes subject to liability to another to whom the duty is owed for any injury sustained by such other, of which that actor’s conduct is a legal cause. Restatement, Second, Torts § 4. See Care; Due care.

In its use in jurisprudence, this word is the correlative of right. Thus, wherever there exists a right in any person, there also rests a corresponding duty upon some other person or upon all persons generally.

Duty to act. Obligation to take some action to prevent harm to another and for failure of which there may or may not be liability in tort depending upon the circum­stances and the relationship of the parties to each other.


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The Documents Fannie and Freddie Never Received

Posted on June 22, 2012 by Neil Garfield

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Editor’s Comment:

Go to the link below which will take you to the article posted on StopForeclosureFraud where  you will see a list of documents (just like the Pooling and Servicing Agreements that everyone ignored) that should have been received by Freddie, Fannie, Ginnie, FHA et al.  Since we now know that the securitization chain of documents was nonexistent until the dealers were called upon to fabricate them for cases in litigation, we know that the absolute minimum requirements for Fannie and Freddie approval were absent. 

This means, contrary to the assertions of 99% of the securitization “auditors”, and contrary to the appearance of a loan on a Fannie or Freddie website, that the loan was never delivered to those agencies nor any of the documents required.  Just as the REMICs never received the loans, Freddie never received the loans.  And since Freddie never received the loans it became the master trustee of “trusts” that never received the loans and were therefore empty.

All this means is that we have to go back to the first day of the alleged transaction.  Investor lenders, operating through dealers, (investment banks) were advancing money for the “purchase” of residential mortgage loans.   The money was advanced to the closing agent who paid off the party claiming to be the prior mortgagee, giving the balance to the seller of the property or to the borrower (if the transaction was supposedly a refinance).  The nightmare for the banks is that if we go back to that first day the parties named as “lender”, “beneficiary”, “mortgagee” are the only parties of record with an apparent recorded interest in the property.  Their problem is that contrary to conventional foreclosure practice, those entities (many of which do not exist anymore) never funded nor even handled the money as a conduit for the loan.  Thus the note and mortgage are fatally defective and cannot be enforced. 

This would mean that the loan never made it into any pool.  That would mean that all of the deals made by the dealers (investment banks) based on the existence of that loan would fall apart leaving them with an enormous liability since they had sold the same deal dozens of times.  And that is the sole reason why the bailout, insurance, credit default swaps, guarantees and other credit enhancements were so large.  The banks used their ability to control the people with their hands on the levers of power within our government to pay for the malfeasance of the banks that have wrecked our economy and our society.

As Iceland has already proven and Europe is in the process of proving, the only answer is to take the stolen money back from the banks, put it back into the private sector, and put it back into government budgets. 

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DO YOU DARE ISSUE A WARRANTY DEED OR ANY DEED WITHOUT LIABILITY?

Posted on September 19, 2011 by Neil Garfield

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The inescapable conclusion at this point, is that title on more than 100 million real estate transactions is at the very least in doubt and quite probably corrupted. In legalese that would be expressed as clouded, unmarketable (i.e., you can’t sell it or finance it, because nobody will take it), defective or fatally defective. The only exceptions I can think of are those deals where raw land has been purchased from a long-standing owner with no debt attached to the land or where a home is purchased or refinanced where the last transaction is twenty years ago. Most people are unaware that they are sitting on shifting sands instead of a solid foundation — where title is properly recorded in the recording office of the county in which the property is located.

Yet people and institutions are issuing instruments fraught with liability and the high probability that the transaction — and the representations contained in the instrument they signed —- will be the subject of litigation later when someone tries to clear title or collect damages. Here are some examples:

  1. A Warranty Deed, required in most transactions, requires the person signing to (a) attest and prove they are who they say they are (b) that they or the party whom they represent has title (usually fee simple absolute) and (c) that if they are signing as an agent, they have provided proof (usually recorded with the deed in properly recordable form) of their authority. The signor is promising, in exchange for the consideration paid, that if this Warranty Deed turns out to be challenged by anyone, they will defend the challenge and pay damages if they lose. Reliance on the title company, mortgage banker, mortgage lender or anyone else is not a defense although the signor could cross claim against those people and bring them into the lawsuit. The point is that the cost of litigating these cases could rise into tens of thousands of dollars. The cost of losing could rise into hundreds of thousands of dollars, or even millions of dollars. 
  2. A “Special Warranty Deed” might have some language of limitations that SHOULD put the buyer on notice but most people rely upon the title or closing agent, or their lawyer (if they have one) to make sure that the deed gives them the title they thought they were getting. This too could give rise to litigation because of representations at closing, representations in the title commitment or policy etc.
  3. A Satisfaction of Mortgage requires the person signing to (a) attest and prove they are who they say they are (b) that they or the party whom they represent is the creditor and is the owner of the rights under the mortgage or deed of trust and (c) that if they are signing as an agent, they have provided proof (usually recorded with the Satisfaction in properly recordable form) of their authority. The signor is promising (unless someone played withe the wording), in exchange for the consideration paid, that if this Satisfaction turns out to be challenged by anyone, they will defend the challenge and pay damages if they lose. Reliance on the title company, mortgage banker, mortgage lender or anyone else is not a defense although the signor could cross claim against those people and bring them into the lawsuit. The point is that the cost of litigating these cases could rise into tens of thousands of dollars. The cost of losing could rise into hundreds of thousands of dollars, or even millions of dollars. 
  4. A Release and Reconveyance is the same as a Satisfaction of Mortgage. So whether you received a satisfaction of mortgage or a release and reconveyance, your assumption that the prior lien was paid off and is now officially satisfied and removed from the records as encumbrance on the land may be, and I think, probably is wrong. We have seen several cases here at livinglies where the wrong party (Ocwen in one case) took the oney issued the Satisfaction and then refused to either give back the money or provide any additional information even though it is now apparent that they were not the creditor, not he owner of the mortgage and had no authority to issue the satisfaction. 
  5. A Trustees Deed on Foreclosure is much the same as a Warranty Deed. Potential Trustee liability here is huge. It requires the person signing to (a) attest and prove they are who they say they are (b) that they or the party whom they represent is the Trustee or “substitute Trustee” (see below) and is the owner of the rights under the mortgage or deed of trust, (c) that if they are signing as an agent, they have provided proof (usually recorded with the Satisfaction in properly recordable form) of their authority and (d) that they are in fact the Trustee and that they have performed the statutory duties of due diligence that is required of a Trustee under a Deed of Trust. The signor is promising (unless someone played withe the wording), in exchange for the consideration paid, that if this Deed turns out to be challenged by anyone, they will defend the challenge and pay damages if they lose. Reliance on the “beneficiary” who usually comes out of nowhere, “lender” who also usually comes out of nowhere, title company, mortgage banker, mortgage lender or anyone else is not a defense although the signor could cross claim against those people and bring them into the lawsuit. The point is that the cost of litigating these cases could rise into tens of thousands of dollars. The cost of losing could rise into hundreds of thousands of dollars, or even millions of dollars. The banks don’t actually worry about this because most “Trustees” are “substitute Trustees” in which a substitution was filed given apparent authority to a new “Trustee” who is not an independent title agent or some similar entity but rather an agent that is in the foreclosure business with the bank that has inserted itself into the transaction as a “pretender lender.” Due diligence by the Trustee would have revealed most robosigning and other fraudulent practices, but due diligence, contrary to the requirements of statute, was never performed because they were no longer taking the orders from the legislature. They were skipping over their statutory duties and taking orders from a party who is merely alleged to be the lender even though it is not the same party as stated on the original note and mortgage ( deed of trust).
  6. Substitution of Trustee: Until securitization came into play it was a rare occurrence that the trustee would be substituted. The Trustee on teh Deed of Trfust would simply be given instructions by the payee on the note and the named secured party in the mortgage) deed of trust) to commence default and dforeclosure proceedigns. But now in virtually every foreclosure there is first a “substitution of trustee’probably because the original trustee would perform the due diligence required under statute and revealed potential problems which would have held up or cancelled the foreclosure. requires the person signing to (a) attest and prove they are who they say they are (b) that they or the party whom they represent is the creditor and is the owner of the rights under the mortgage or deed of trust and (c) that if they are signing as an agent, they have provided proof (usually recorded with the Satisfaction in properly recordable form) of their authority. The signor is promising (unless someone played withe the wording) that if this Substitution of Trustee turns out to be challenged by anyone, they will defend the challenge and pay damages if they lose. Reliance on the “beneficiary” who usually comes out of nowhere, “lender” who also usually comes out of nowhere, title company, mortgage banker, mortgage lender or anyone else is not a defense although the signor could cross claim against those people and bring them into the lawsuit. In many cases the substance of the substitution is that the “new” beneficiary is in effect appointing itself or its agents who promise to do their bidding instead of using the original Trustee or someone else who take their duties seriously. The point is that the cost of litigating these cases could rise into tens of thousands of dollars. The cost of losing could rise into hundreds of thousands of dollars, or even millions of dollars. The banks don’t actually worry about this because most “Trustees” are “substitute Trustees” in which a substitution was filed given apparent authority to a new “Trustee” who is not an independent title agent or some similar entity but rather an agent that is in the foreclosure business with the bank that has inserted itself into the transaction as a “pretender lender.” Due diligence by the Trustee would have revealed most robosigning and other fraudulent practices, but due diligence, contrary to the requirements of statute, was never performed because they were no longer taking the orders from the legislature. They were skipping over their statutory duties and taking orders from a party who is merely alleged to be the lender even though it is not the same party as stated on the original note and mortgage ( deed of trust).

There are many other documents that fall within the same level of analysis like the Notice of Default (which comes from the alleged authority of the  Substitute Trustee, based upon information from what is probably an undisclosed source, the Notice of Sale (which appears right on its face, but is subject to the same analysis as to the signor, and other documents.

The Bottom Line is that homeowners and institutions alike are facing potential litigation and liability as the years roll on, with few if any witnesses to back them up and in the case of homeowners precious little in the way of resources to fight off the litigation.

Check with a real property and litigation attorney before you take any action based upon what you see here. They should be licensed in the county in which the property is located.

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CERVANTES OPINION CONTAINS ERROR ON MERS’ LEGAL TITLE

Posted on September 11, 2011 by Neil Garfield

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SEE CERVANTES 9TH CIRCUIT OPINION

DISTINCTION BETWEEN LENDER AND BENEFICIARY ROOT OF MESS

DARREL BLOMBERG points out that the 9th Circuit might be just as confused as trial judges about MERS. The Court acknowledges in the opinion that MERS owns nothing and in fact is intended to own nothing, acting merely as a placeholder for whatever entity is eventually “designated” by unknown players in the securitization game. Yet at page 16985, the court’s opinion contains the following paragraph:

“At the origination of the loan, MERS is designated in the deed of trust as a nominee for the lender and the lender’s “successors and assigns,” and as the deed’s “beneficiary” which holds legal title to the security interest conveyed. If the lender sells or assigns the beneficial interest in the loan to another MERS member, the change is recorded only in the MERS database, not in county records, because MERS con- tinues to hold the deed on the new lender’s behalf. If the ben- eficial interest in the loan is sold to a non-MERS member, the transfer of the deed from MERS to the new lender is recorded in county records and the loan is no longer tracked in the MERS system.”

Darrel’s point is that the court is confused, if it is reporting that MERS or any actual beneficiary is the holder of any title. The Deed of Trust is signed by the homeowner and vests title in a Trustee for the benefit of the beneficiary. If the beneficiary were the actual recipient of title, the non-judicial power of sale would be inapplicable. In order for non-judicial sale to occur, there MUST be an intervening “objective” party that provides some assurance of due diligence to protect the interests of the homeowner and the beneficiary.

It is possible that the Court was merely reporting the scheme of the “lenders” rather than the actuality, but if that is the case, the opinion is unclear. As it stands,  the opinion appears to be saying that the actual title is vested in the named beneficiary. If so, besides the point raised above, the deed on foreclosure would need to be issued and executed by MERS or whatever party was named as beneficiary. Thus the chain of title would be further corrupted by  having an on-record transfer from homeowner to trustee followed by an on-record transfer of title from beneficiary to whomever submitted the “credit bid.”

Darrel is right, I think. And I don’t think it is merely some scrivener’s error. It demonstrates the confusion of even the higher courts of appeal with the entire process of non-judicial sale, a CHOICE that is selected by “lenders” which was intended to be a very narrow window but has now become the greatest escape hatch of all time. Through that window pretender lenders are throwing millions of homes that otherwise could not have been foreclosed because the pretenders were just that — pretenders, who had no interest in the loan, and who had no right to submit a credit bid because they were not the creditor. How could US Bank or BOA et al submit a credit bid on a loan where they were neither the holder nor the owner of the debt, much less both the holder and the owner?

These parties are using non-judicial foreclosure to side-step the due process requirements of Arizona law and the law of other states that allow non-judicial foreclosure. If they truly could prevail in a well-pleaded complaint and prove their case according to established rules of evidence, they undoubtedly would have done so, just to prove that the borrowers’ cries of “foul” were mere technicalities and not based upon the reality that they took out a loan and now don’t want to pay for it. A few cases in each state and the argument would be over. The pretenders are avoiding reality — the one in which THEY are seeking to get a free house.

The 9th Circuit was mistaken in its language quoted above. MERS, or for that matter ANY beneficiary holds an equitable interest, not legal title. They are the beneficiaries of a trust enabled by statute in which the home is the asset, the trustor is the homeowner and the trustee is a party who will hold title until the loan obligation is satisfied. The beneficiary does not hold legal title. It holds no title at all. It is the beneficiary of the trust and is entitled to receive the proceeds of sale should the house be sold to satisfy the loan.

The error quoted here is an example of how the courts are attempting to accommodate the banks and in so doing trying to put their left foot in their right pocket. Adding the name “MERS” adds nothing to the rights of a beneficiary, because to even entertain any other construction would be to violate the enabling non-judicial statute, and violate the due process clauses in the U.S. and State constitutions. Where MERS is named as beneficiary, it has the right to receive the proceeds of sale if the home is sold in foreclosure. The problem is that MERS was intentionally named only as a placeholder (nominee, straw-man) and the deed of trust says so, because it distinguishes between the “lender” and the “beneficiary.”

Nothing in legislative notes in any state that I have researched indicates that this dichotomy between “lender” and “beneficiary” was considered, nor is there anything to suggest it would have been permitted by any of the legislatures if it had been considered. Quite the reverse is true.

The legislative presumption was that the lender and beneficiary were one and the same. The presumption was that non-judicial sale applied in non-adversarial  situations in which it was necessary to conduct a foreclosure sale, the lender was the beneficiary and therefore was also the creditor, and therefore capable of submitting a credit bid and worthy of receiving, without objection from the homeowner, the deed from the foreclosure sale. It is only in this context that enabling statutes for non-judicial sales are constitutional in their construction and application.

Here we have a different situation. MERS specifically disclaims any rights to such proceeds even though it is named as beneficiary. It does so consistent with the new distinction, created outside the enabling statutes for the power of sale, in which there is a  difference between “lender” and beneficiary.” So the “lender” is actually the beneficiary even though MERS is named as beneficiary. Although awkward, this might fly if the lender actually made the loan and was the creditor. But in most cases, the “lender” is also a placeholder. See any of the bankruptcy schedules and orders entered for mortgage originators that were designated as “lenders.”

Thus Cervantes stands on a loose foundation: we have a beneficiary that admits it is not entitled to anything and a lender who in fact is not entitled to anything because it was also just a placeholder for an undisclosed principal. Neither one of them can submit a credit bid and neither one of them has ever possessed the power to instruct the Trustee on the deed of trust to issue the notice of default and notice of sale. The original trustee would obviously have no part of a foreclosure sale in which it was receiving instructions from parties that never appeared on the deed of trust or the chain of title. And that, my friends, is the reason why we have yet another new entry of new terms without meaning: the substitute trustee.

When you think about it, the securitizers were obviously making it up as they went along, which is why there were lawyers who refused to draft any of these documents, because in their own words, they thought it was not just illegal it was probably criminal. By inserting a nominee lender and nominee beneficiary into the transaction without disclosing the principal from whom the loan was obtained and by substituting their own people as trustees, they were assured of grabbing millions of properties while appearing to comply with statutes. They neither complied with statutes nor with the standards of good faith and fairness required under those statutes.

But here is the rub for them which the banks are desperately trying to avoid: in the vast majority of transactions in which a securitized debt was involved, the use of a placeholder, in lieu of a real party in interest, was not just part of the transaction — it was the whole transaction. At the time of execution of the mortgage, there was no real party in interest named or described in the mortgage — the very thing that the legislature of each state meant to avoid when they passed recording statutes.

Thus at the time of execution, the homeowner borrower was being intentionally kept in the dark about the identity of the creditor. In fact, when the mortgage was recorded, the general public was being intentionally kept in the dark about the identity of the creditor. There is no state in which that kind of document gives rise to a valid lien against the property, nor could it. Recording is intended to provide notice to the world that someone has a lien. In the case of nearly all transactions involving securitized debt, the “someone” that had a lien was a fictitious character, like Donald Duck. In all such instances, state law provides that the mortgage  does not attach as a lien.

The promissory note is another story entirely subject to its own problems. Suffice it to say, that if you check with an attorney who is competent and licensed in the jurisdiction in which your property is located, you will find that your mortgage, while it exists, is not a lien against your property. That might sound like a contradiction in terms, but it is nevertheless true. Thus the obligation you owe, if any, is unsecured. Do not act on this until you consult with counsel.

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ANOTHER CALIFORNIA BANKRUPTCY JUDGE SLAMS PRETENDER LENDERS AND MERS

Posted on April 14, 2011 by Neil Garfield

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SEE MANN order_br_cally_so_dist_salazar_vs_us_bank_denying_mfrs_mers_4_11_2011

Bankruptcy Judge Margaret M. Mann GETS IT!

1 Posted by Dan Edstrom on April 12, 2011 at 8:19 pm

Bankruptcy Judge Margaret M. Mann GETS IT!

By Daniel Edstrom
DTC Systems, Inc.

Coming off of the heels of in re: Agard (http://dtc-systems.net/2011/02/mers-agency-york-bankruptcy-court-agard/), the Honorable Judge Mann from the United States Bankruptcy Court Southern District of California took 76 days to review the Motion for Relief From Automatic Stay for the in re: Salazar Chapter 13 bankruptcy (Bankruptcy No: 10-17456-MM13).   The findings of fact and conclusions of law were an amazing reading that confirms many of the issues we have been discussing in regards to loans, securitization and foreclosure.  Like Judge Grossman in the agard case, Judge Mann goes to great lengths to research the details that are applicable to this case.   Here are some highlights:

  • Assignments must be recorded before the foreclosure sale

  • Civil Code Section 2932.5 applies to Deeds of Trust

  • Recorded assignments are necessary despite MERS’ role

  • The Gomes case does not apply [to the Salazar case]

  • US Bank or MERS cannot contract away their obligations to comply with the foreclosure statutes

  • As a matter of law, Salazar’s acknowledgment cannot be read as a waiver of his right to be informed of a change in beneficiary status.

  • MERS System is not an alternative to statutory foreclosure law

  • US Bank as the foreclosing assignee was obligated to record its interest before the sale despite MERS’ initial role under the DOT, and this role cannot be used to bypass Civil Code section 2932.5.  Since US Bank failed to record its interest, Salazar has a valid property interest in his residence that is entitled to protection through the automatic stay

  • Cause does not exist to grant relief from stay

  • Denying relief from stay at this time is the least prejudicial option for both parties

 

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AFTER THE SALE: PART III On the Courthouse Steps

Posted on June 10, 2010 by Neil Garfield

Submitted by Charles Koppa

The auctioneer represents the “beneficiary” in the sale.. If there is a “reserve amount minimum” (see below) the auctioneer actually bids up as agent for the unnamed beneficiary! The recipient “beneficial trust” is finally publically identified and documented by the Foreclosing Trustee in the recorded Trustees Deed Upon Sale.  Try to find a human officer for that trust!

Beneficiary makes no personal bid, delivers no cash, and is allowed a credit bid!  PROBLEM: a beneficiary (if known) would be a “party in interest” and could not be a bonafide buyer.  An est. 80% of the Courthouse sales go “Back to Beneficiary” (publicly unknown) and therefore are unlawful.  Lack of Notice and availability of Due Process to meet your accuser are historically common.

Predatory devaluations, plus untitled transfer of foreclosed mortgage notes systematically confiscated by “investment trusts” that were structured by Bank Holding Companies with no skin in the game, plus processing by shadow intermediaries “against the borrower”, equals “Tyranny on the Courthouse Steps!”

Sellers have the option of setting a hidden Reserve Price that is above the minimum starting bid.  If a reserve price is in effect, then the seller does not have sell the item unless the high bid meets or exceeds his reserve.  Auctions with a reserve price will be noted in their listing, describing whether the reserve has been met or not.  The actual amount of the reserve price is not revealed to bidders, until it has been met.

When you submit a bid on a reserve price auction, one of three things might happen:
(1) If the reserve has already been met, then your bid will be submitted at one increment above the next highest competitor, in the same manner as an auction without a reserve price.
(2) If the reserve has not been met, and your maximum bid is also less than the reserve, then your bid will be entered at one increment above the next highest competitor.
(3) If the reserve has not been met, but your maximum bid is enough to meet the reserve, then your bid will be entered at exactly the seller’s reserve price.  If your maximum was above the seller’s reserve, then your proxy will defend your bid, up to your maximum.If you are the highest bidder at auction close but the reserve was not met, then neither you nor the seller are obligated to the transaction.  However, you may wish to negotiate further via email, to see if a mutually satisfactory price can be reached.

EXAMPLES:

No sale:
Item #9999 had a minimum starting bid of $100.00
The seller set a reserve price in his listing of $200.00.
At the end of the auction, the highest bid is $175.00.
In this case, the seller is not obligated to sell for $175.00, but may choose to do so anyway.

Sale:
Item #8888 had a minimum starting bid of $900.00.
The seller set a reserve price in his listing of $1,200.00.
At the end of the auction, the highest bid is $1,225.00.
In this case, the seller is obligated to sell for $1,225.00 to the highest bidder.

Filed under: bubble, CORRUPTION, evidence, expert witness, foreclosure, foreclosure mill, Forensic Analysis Workshop, GTC | Honor, HERS, investment banking, Investor, MODIFICATION, Mortgage, Motion Practice and Discovery, securities fraud, Securitization Survey, Servicer, STATUTES, trustee, workshop | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

TAPE Recording Shows “Trustee” is NOT the party with Fiduciary Powers or Obligations

Posted on May 13, 2010 by Neil Garfield

One of the interesting things about Arizona Law is that it is perfectly legal to tape record a telephone conversation without the knowledge or consent of the parties to that call.

I have a tape recording of a conversation between a borrower up in Scottsdale and an officer of Deutsch bank who is in charge of “Asset Acquisition.” His name might well be on the documents in your case. In that conversation he says that Deutsch is the “beneficiary”.. “for the “benefit of the investors”. He says that the whole arrangement is “counter-intuitive” (used that word more than once). Although the beneficiaries are the investors and Deutsch is named as Trustee, the Trustee has nothing to do. That is because the servicer (One West in the conversation) actually has complete discretion on all issues including modification. As to whether the loan was modifiable he explicitly deferred to the servicer.

Thus he is saying that notwithstanding appearances and what would be logical the ACTUAL arrangement is that the servicer has all power over the assets that have been conveyed to investors. He never mentioned the “Trust” (remember my contention is that there is no trust, that the SPV is merely a conduit vehicle for aggregating the assets and revenue streams from borrowers, insurers, counterparties on CDS etc.) He even refers to the servicer as having “fiduciary” obligations but shies away from any reference to Deutsch having fiduciary duties.

In my opinion, this tape both confirms my opinion and supplements it with a surprising detail, to wit: the servicer is the one with the power of a “Trustee” and not the named “Trustee” (in this case Deutsch). But the power of the real trustee (servicer) is limited to the provisions of the note, excludes third party payments from insurers, counterparties and federal bailouts, and is without reference to the encumbrance allegedly created by the Deed of Trust (Mortgage).

Boiling this down to its essential elements, the owner of the “asset” (the loan) is a group of investors who accepted certificated or non-certificated interests conveying to them a percentage interest in the flow of funds (principal and interest) and ownership of the note. The reference to a “Trust” is nominal (in name only) and the reference to a “Trustee” is both nominal and misleading. The beneficiary under the Deed of Trust, as seen by this representative of Deutsch is also the investor in that Deutsch is only named as a straw man for the investors as a convenience and with the result that the true beneficiaries are not disclosed.

Therefore, on its face, the beneficiary on the original Deed of Trust, the beneficiary named in the instruments used to securitize the loan, and the beneficiary in fact are all different. The original note also names a payee that is different from the payee under the assignments, which is different from the payee under the instruments of securitization and different from the actual party (the servicer) who receives those payments. In practice, according to this officer, the actual payee under the securitization documents (the investors) is different than the parties receiving payment and enforcing payment.

The effect of this “counterintuitive” arrangement is that the beneficiary and the party who represents themselves as the proper holder in due course or owner of the loan are different. All of this presumes that the loan was in fact properly, legally and successfully assigned and securitized — a question of fact since there are multiple conditions to acceptance of the assignment and multiple conditions subsequent (replacement of loan with another, buy back of the loan etc.), which are also questions of fact as to whether those conditions subsequent did or did not occur. In addition there are subsequent events (third party payments in accordance with insurance contracts, credit default swaps and other credit enhancements written into the securitization documents) that are also questions of fact.  And in either related or non-related context, there is the fact that many of these special purpose vehicles (“Trusts”) have been dissolved with the “assets” resecuritized into brand new securities sold to new investors.

Filed under: CASES, CORRUPTION, expert witness, foreclosure, foreclosure mill, Forensic Analysis Workshop, GTC | Honor, HERS, investment banking, Investor, MODIFICATION, Mortgage, Motion Practice and Discovery, securities fraud, Securitization Survey, Servicer, STATUTES, trustee, workshop | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 35 Comments »

ID THEFT: Example of one person’s response

Posted on April 29, 2010 by Neil Garfield

Editors’ Note: In response to my post on ID THEFT I received a number of comments and ideas. Here is one example of how someone stuck to the message and forced the issue using ID theft as a defensive tactic as well as preparing for an offensive response.

Are you reading my mind?
Out of the blue in Oct. Got a letter with my mortgage company letterhead stating “welcome to new mortgage company”. Said they changed their name. Separate letter said on Nov 6. stop making payments to them by their name and Nov. 7 start making payments to them by new name.
I know about contracts so I attempted to not contract with new name. It’s been a disaster.

1. No assignment 5 months out, in the Official Real Estate Records.
2. Real Trustee still holds title. I contacted him, but he only represents the beneficiary ‘who has the note and an interest secured in the home”.
3. Checked all three credit reports, 5 months out. Two show old name one show new name all have the same info. I disputed new name in the credit report that had it – stating I didn’t know them.
4. I disputed old name in another credit report since they are no longer exist to force identification of who is updating that report. Got copies of all.
4. Checked SEC filings. Investors bought the first name corporation in 2008. Then on Nov. 6, 2009 they merged the bank into their business. That explains why they said to stop paying one name.
5. Foreclosures under old name on file in Deed of Trust has been without assignment or transfer filings. Using Substitute Trustee. Three problems. Original Trustee still holds title. I already wrote him and know this. Deed of Trust on file has no provision for Substituting the Trustee. By virtue of the ‘merger’ they should have the original documents.
6. Spent 5 months asking them to validate their claim. They send a copy of the Certified copy of my Deed of Trust on file in the public (that does not name them), and a copy of a Certified copy of the Promissory note (that does not name them). Two problems They can’t attach to the Deed of Trust without assignment..name change or not…their name is ‘not’ the named Lender nor beneficiary in the Deed of Trust. And the Promissory Note was made out to a specific entity. You can’t possibly assume that I have to know that when you sell it, they can come up and say ‘pay me’ when the promissory note is supposed to be held by the person you promised to pay. If they sell it, that’s a different agreement between them and the other buyer, but I can’t be forced into their third party agreement as long as I agree to pay you..you stay right there and let me pay you..but don’t force me to pay someone I did not ‘promise to pay’.
7. They’ve hired a law firm (setting up for a substitute trustee situation). I contacted the firm. (not pro bono, not pro se, no attorney..just me and told them I don’t recognize the other company and I have asked them to validate and they respond with stronger demand for money.) Maybe that’s why I got the ‘copies’ I did get from the mortgage company that does not support their claim.
8. Informed the attorney of their violation of FDCPA by forwarding information to another party and by not disclosing the amount attempted to collect is in dispute.
9. I wouldn’t trust an attorney at this time. The United States is in Bankruptcy, China filed a lien for 45 Million dollars in December 2009.
10. Have a copy of a Substitute Trustee sale by this company. They never released the lien on the debtor they foreclosed on after the sale. If they had the papers they could have released the lien.
11. Once you admit there is a contract you can’t use Statue of Frauds which helps me because I have refused to contract and have refused to pay and requested validation of their claim of a debt owed to them.
Thinking seriously about filing SEC complaint and sending the ‘Communications, Notice and Order’ to the named person listed in their SEC filing and a copy of that to the law firm listed with the words “With a copy to” – in their SEC filing
My identity has been stolen by the company. When I establish an account with one firm, that does not give a right to another firm to step up and say I have the account, change the name, change the terms of your initial agreement and start paying me now because I have a ‘new name’. How can you have an account demanding payment when there is no agreement and you are really a new entity, not just a new name?
I’m learning about Statute of Frauds. It would also appear that Deceptive Trade Practices can be proven in this mess. A company who has no contract attaches to your credit report as if you’ve established business agreement with them? They have no definition in your Deed of Trust, yet they can get an attorney to represent their interest in your document and start nonjudicial foreclosure proceedings. If they have the papers it takes to change the name on the credit report, they should have the papers it takes to file an assignment/transfer and change the name on the Deed of Trust.
I’ve not paid them any money, but I have filed FTC and Attorney General complaints. Not sure if I have to pay the 5 months in arrears as Threat, Duress, and Coercion to get some action done by these public resources I’m using to filing the compliant.

Filed under: bubble, CASES, CDO, CORRUPTION, Eviction, expert witness, foreclosure, foreclosure mill, Forensic Analysis Workshop, GTC | Honor, HERS, investment banking, MODIFICATION, Mortgage, Motion Practice and Discovery, securities fraud, Securitization Survey, Servicer, STATUTES, trustee, workshop | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 9 Comments »

SEPARATION OF DEED OF TRUST FROM NOTE: Bellistri Opinion

Posted on April 28, 2010 by Neil Garfield

There is a lot of conflicting opinions about this. My opinion is that the confusion arises not from the law, not from application of the law and not from what is written on the note or deed of Trust. If you look at the Bellistri Missouri case the issue is well settled. And the problem is not what is written, it is what is assumed to be written. The Bellistri case, 284SW 3d 619, (Missouri Appeal, cert. reportedly denied) coupled with its quote from Restatement 3rd is simple: put one name on the note and another on the DOT as beneficiary (particularly when the beneficiary is MERS and therefore an undisclosed principal) and you have direct evidence that the intention of the parties was to separate the note from the mortgage. The burden of proof thus shifts to the alleged creditor.

Conflict comes not from the law or the wording on the instruments but from the inherent question of “why would anyone want to do that?” There are of course many answers to that question in a securitized mortgage context. But it is the existence of the question that causes people to lean toward the idea that no reasonable person would have intended that and to assume that the parties, including the borrower, would never have intended WHAT WAS WRITTEN.

I think the point of the Bellistri case is simple: factually, the note and DOT are split and according to the Restatement 3rd, they can never be put back together again. The note, while still enforceable as an instrument by itself, is no longer secured by an encumbrance on the property. The “mistake” is that of the drafter of the instruments. They want to say, much later in time, what we NOW mean is that the beneficiary is X, who is not the payee on the note,, but X has received an assignment of the note. Thus NOW the beneficiary and the payee are the same which means we can foreclose.

So the question put to the Judge is can a note and security instrument, initially made out to two different parties be LATER joined and if so, what does that mean for enforcement. My first comment is that once you have established that facially the note and DOT were split, your prima facie case is met and the burden goes to the “lender” to prove they are the creditor along with a whole bunch of other things that are not unlike the elements of proving up a lost or destroyed note. You can’t just say it happened. You must explain and prove HOW it happened.

But the simple answer to the question as per the Restatement 3rd, is “NO.” The reason why they cannot be joined later is not just because Restatement 3rd says so, it is the reason Restatement 3rd says that, to wit: if you allowed, particularly in a non-judicial setting, parties not named on the note and not named as beneficiary to later act because of a claim as being both, you are introducing uncertainty into the marketplace which is the precise reason we have the law of contracts, property records and such. The moral hazard is raised from possibility to near certainty when you KNOW from the beginning that the payee and the beneficiary are two different parties and the beneficiary is not the real party so the knowledge includes, from the beginning, that there is at least one additional undisclosed party.

Let’s take the simplest example we can given the complexity of securitized residential mortgages. ABC is named the Payee on the note. MERS is named the beneficiary. MERS obviously has some understanding with a third party DEF not to make a claim on the loan (according to their website). So we must presume that they have that understanding and that maybe it is in writing in some general type of contract which was neither disclosed nor revealed to exist at the time of the closing with the borrower. DEF defaults in its payment obligations to MERS. MERS now says we refuse to perform under our contract with DEF. Borrower knows nothing of DEF nor of DEF’s payment default to MERS. Borrower pays the note in full to ABC. ABC returns the note as paid in full. Borrower wants a release and reconveyance (satisfaction) so the title record is clear.

Now it MIGHT be that DEF=ABC. But we don’t know that. So for purposes of your case, you MUST assume that DEF is simply an undisclosed third party. Borrower asks MERS for the release and reconveyance.  MERS refuses because it wasn’t paid by DEF and because it has no idea whether you paid the right person. With MERS refusing to execute a document releasing the lien, Borrower now has a defect in title that is unmarketable.

Borrower files a quiet title suit against MERS. MERS says it was named as beneficiary but that the DOT clearly states it serves only as nominee and therefore has no power to do anything. Now you have, on record, that the beneficiary is not MERS but the undisclosed third party DEF. The court MIGHT grant the final judgment, but it would then be adjudicating the rights of other parties who are not present in court, thus leaving the title clouded and possibly still unmarketable.

Another possibility is that the Court would inquire or allow discovery to allow the identification of DEF. Assuming MERS wishes to comply, there is still a problem. Data entry is NOT performed by MERS employees. Data entry is performed by “members” with passwords and user ID’s. Thus all MERS can say is that at a particular point in time MERS computer records show DEF, which was assigned to ABC or perhaps yet another party. The assignment is executed by Jane Jones as “limited signing officer” for MERS. MERS can’t say they know Jane Jones or anything about her because she doesn’t work for MERS. Therefore the only competent evidence from MERS is the data in fields populated by unknown sources of data input, and references to documents that were never seen or kept by MERS. The evidence from MERS thus has little or no probative value.

So now the Court or borrower goes to DEF and says “Who is Jane Jones?” DEF replies they don’t know because the assignment document was prepared by a foreclosure processing firm in Jacksonville, Florida named DOCX. DOCX has no contract with ABC or DEF or MERS. They were just following orders from yet a fourth party who is unidentified, and whose instructions were relayed through a fifth firm that serves as the correspondent or document manager once the loan goes into foreclosure (perhaps ordered by the servicer, BAC).

Thus the reason that a note and DOT can never be joined at any time other than the creation of those documents and executed contemporaneously with the funding of the obligation is that the contract and its performance is not based upon a condition subsequent (because such a condition would render the contract inchoate until the condition subsequent arrived or which would extinguish the obligation, note and mortgage). For there to be enforceability there must be certainty in the contract. Certainty can only be achieved if the terms and parties who are expected to perform are identified with sufficient clarity that any reasonable person would say they are known.

A borrower who signs papers without having a known party who is required by law to execute a satisfaction (release and reconveyance) has in effect executed documentation without a counterparty. The document is therefore void. Since the document (note, DOT, etc.) is only evidence of the obligation that arose because the borrower did in fact receive a benefit from the funding of the loan, the obligation survives while the note and/or DOT do not. However, in order to achieve certainty in the marketplace, the obligation is not secured unless and until some party identifies itself as the creditor and establishes a subsequent encumbrance through judgment lien, equitable or constructive trust or some other means.

Such a creditor action would be subject to rigorous requirements of pleading and proof. In the context of a securitized residential mortgage, the creditor can only be the party(ies) who advanced actual money, from which money the borrower’s loan was funded. In the context of mortgage-backed securities, a creditor who pleads that he expected a secured loan, must also plead all the documents and transactions that gave rise to advancing the money. This would mean that the creditor would be required to disclose and account for credit enhancements, insurance, credit default swaps, over-collateralization, cross-collateralization, and payments received from all sources pursuant to the terms under which the creditor advanced said funds.

Those terms are included in the prospectus and bond indenture which incorporate the pooling and service agreement, Depositor Agreement, Assignment and Assumption Agreements etc. In other words, the actual terms upon which the creditor advanced money were different from the actual terms accepted by the borrower. A court in equity would thus be required to allocate equity and liability for the various unpaid and paid obligations of multiple parties whose existence was unknown to borrower at the time of the loan closing, and whose existence even now would be at best dimly understood by the borrower or any other person who was not extremely well-versed in the securitization of credit.

Filed under: CDO, CORRUPTION, Eviction, expert witness, foreclosure, foreclosure mill, Forensic Analysis Workshop, GTC | Honor, HERS, Investor, MODIFICATION, Mortgage, Motion Practice and Discovery, securities fraud, Securitization Survey, Servicer, workshop | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 26 Comments »

Starting Action AFTER the Non-Judicial Sale: Get the Information

Posted on April 27, 2010 by Neil Garfield

33-809. Request for copies of notice of sale; mailing by trustee; disclosure of information regarding trustee sale

A. A person desiring a copy of a notice of sale under a trust deed, at any time subsequent to the recording of the trust deed and prior to the recording of a notice of sale pursuant thereto, shall record in the office of the county recorder in any county in which part of the trust property is situated a duly acknowledged request for a copy of any such notice of sale. The request shall set forth the name and address of the person or persons requesting a copy of such notice and shall identify the trust deed by setting forth the county, docket or book and page of the recording data thereof and by stating the names of the original parties to such deed, the date the deed was recorded and the legal description of the entire trust property and shall be in substantially the following form:

Request for Notice

Request is hereby made that a copy of any notice of sale under the trust deed recorded in docket or book ___________ at page ________, records of ______________ county, Arizona, _____________________________, _______________________________,

(legal description of trust property)

Executed by ________________________ as trustor, in which ______________ is named as beneficiary and __________________ as trustee, be mailed to _________________ at ___________________.

Dated this _______________ day of _______________, _____.

___________________

Signature

(Acknowledgement)

B. Not later than thirty days after recording the notice of sale, the trustee shall mail by certified or registered mail, with postage prepaid, a copy of the notice of sale that reflects the recording date together with any notice required to be given by subsection C of this section, addressed as follows:

1. To each person whose name and address are set forth in a request for notice, which has been recorded prior to the recording of the notice of sale, directed to the address designated in such request.

2. To each person who, at the time of recording of the notice of sale, appears on the records of the county recorder in the county in which any part of the trust property is situated to have an interest in any of the trust property. The copy of the notice sent pursuant to this paragraph shall be addressed to the person whose interest appears of record at the address set forth in the document. If no address for the person is set forth in the document, the copy of the notice may be addressed in care of the person to whom the recorded document evidencing such interest was directed to be mailed at the time of its recording or to any other address of the person known or ascertained by the trustee. If the interest that appears on the records of the county recorder is a deed of trust, a copy of the notice only needs to be mailed to the beneficiary under the deed of trust. If any person having an interest of record or the trustor, or any person who has recorded a request for notice, desires to change the address to which notice shall be mailed, the change shall be accomplished by a request as provided under this section.

3. For single family residential properties only, to the property address, except that the copy mailed pursuant to this paragraph may be mailed by first class mail.

C. The trustee, within five business days after the recordation of a notice of sale, shall mail by certified or registered mail, with postage prepaid, a copy of the notice of sale to each of the persons who were parties to the trust deed except the trustee. The copy of the notice mailed to the parties need not show the recording date of the notice. The notice sent pursuant to this subsection shall be addressed to the mailing address specified in the trust deed. In addition, notice to each party shall contain a statement that a breach or nonperformance of the trust deed or the contract or contracts secured by the trust deed, or both, has occurred, and setting forth the nature of such breach or nonperformance and of the beneficiary’s election to sell or cause to be sold the trust property under the trust deed and the additional notice shall be signed by the beneficiary or the beneficiary’s agent. A copy of the additional notice shall also be sent with the notice provided for in subsection B, paragraph 2 of this section to all persons whose interest in the trust property is subordinate in priority to that of the deed of trust along with a written statement that the interest may be subject to being terminated by the trustee’s sale. The written statement may be contained in the statement of breach or nonperformance.

D. No request for a copy of a notice recorded pursuant to this section, nor any statement or allegation in any request, nor any record of request, shall affect the title to the trust property or be deemed notice to any person that a person requesting a copy of notice of sale has or claims any interest in, or claim upon, the trust property.

E. At any time that the trust deed is subject to reinstatement pursuant to section 33-813, but not sooner than thirty days after recordation of the notice of trustee’s sale, the trustee shall upon receipt of a written request, provide, if actually known to the trustee, the following information relating to the trustee’s sale and the trust property:

1. The unpaid principal balance of the note or other obligation which is secured by the deed of trust.

2. The name and address of record of the owner of the trust property as of the date of recordation of the notice of trustee’s sale.

3. A list of the liens and encumbrances upon the trust property as of the date of recordation of the notice of trustee’s sale, excluding those matters set forth in section 33-438, subsection A.

If the trustee elects to charge a fee for providing the information requested, the fee shall not exceed five per cent of the amount the trustee may charge pursuant to section 33-813, subsection B, paragraph 4, except that the trustee shall not charge a fee that is more than one hundred dollars or be required to accept a fee that is less than thirty dollars but may accept a lesser fee at the trustee’s discretion. The trustee, or any other person furnishing information pursuant to this subsection to the trustee, shall not be subject to liability for any error or omission in providing the information requested, except for the wilful and intentional failure to provide information in the trustee’s actual possession.

F. Beginning at 9:00 a.m. and continuing until 5:00 p.m. mountain standard time on the last business day preceding the day of sale and beginning at 9:00 a.m. mountain standard time and continuing until the time of sale on the day of the sale, the trustee shall make available the actual bid or a good faith estimate of the credit bid the beneficiary is entitled to make at the sale. If the actual bid or good faith estimate is not available during the prescribed time period, the trustee shall postpone the sale until the trustee is able to comply with this subsection.

G. In providing information pursuant to subsections E and F of this section, the trustee, without obligation or liability for the accuracy or completeness of the information, may respond to oral requests, respond orally or in writing or provide additional information not required by such subsections. With respect to property that is the subject of a trustee’s sale, the beneficiary of such deed of trust or the holder of any prior lien may, but shall not be required to, provide information concerning such deed of trust or any prior lien that is not required by subsection E or F of this section and may charge a reasonable fee for providing the information. The providing of such information by any beneficiary or holder of a prior lien shall be without obligation or liability for the accuracy or completeness of the information.

Filed under: CORRUPTION, Eviction, foreclosure, GTC | Honor, Investor, Mortgage, securities fraud | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

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