Financial Industry Caught with Its Hand in the Cookie Jar

Like the infamous NINJA loans, the REMICs ought to be dubbed NEITs — nonexistent inactive trusts.

The idea of switching lenders without permission of the borrower has been accepted for centuries. But the idea of switching borrowers without permission of the “lender” had never been accepted until the era of false claims of securitization.

This is just one example of how securitization, in practice, has gone far off the rails. It is significant to students of securitization because it demonstrates how the debt, note and mortgage have been separated with each being a commodity to sell to multiple buyers.

Let us help you analyze your case: 202-838-6345
Get a consult and TEAR (Title & Encumbrances Analysis and & Report) 202-838-6345. The TEAR replaces and greatly enhances the former COTA (Chain of Title Analysis, including a one page summary of Title History and Gaps).
https://www.vcita.com/v/lendinglies to schedule CONSULT, leave message or make payments. It’s better than calling!
THIS ARTICLE IS NOT A LEGAL OPINION UPON WHICH YOU CAN RELY IN ANY INDIVIDUAL CASE. HIRE A LAWYER.
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see https://asreport.americanbanker.com/news/new-risk-for-loan-investors-lending-to-a-different-company

Leveraged loan investors are now concerned about whether they are funding a loan to one entity and then “by succession” ending up with another borrower with a different credit profile, reputation, etc. You can’t make this stuff up. This is only possible because the debt has been separated from the promissory note — the same way the debt, note and mortgage were treated as entirely separate commodities in the “securitization” of residential mortgage debt. The lack of connection between the paper and the debt has allowed borrowers to sell or transfer their position as borrower to another borrower leaving the “lender” holding a debt from a new borrower. This sounds crazy but it is nevertheless true. [I am NOT suggesting that individual homeowners try this. It won’t work]

Keep in mind that most certificates issued by investment bankers purportedly from nonexistent inactive trusts (call them NEITs instead of REMICs) contain an express provision that states in clear unequivocal language that the holder of the certificate has no right, title or interest to the underlying notes and mortgages. This in effect creates a category of defrauded investors using much the same logic as the use of MERS in which MERS expressly disclaims and right, title or interest in the money (i.e., the debt), or the mortgages that reregistered by third party “members.”

Of course those of us who understand this cloud of smoke and mirrors know that the securitization was never real. The single transaction rule used in tax cases establishes conclusively that the only real parties in interest are the investors and the borrowers. Everyone else is simply an intermediary with no more interest in any transaction than your depository bank has when you write a check on your account. The bank can’t assert ownership of the TV you just paid for. But if you separate the maker of the check from the seller of the goods so that neither knows of the existence of the other then the intermediary is free to make whatever false claims it seeks to make.

In the world of fake securitization or as Adam Levitin has coined it, “Securitization Fail”, the successors did not pay for the debt but did get the paper (note and mortgage or deed of trust). All the real monetary transactions took place outside the orbit of the falsely identified REMIC “Trust.” The debt, by law and custom, has always been considered to arise between Party A and Party B where one of them is the borrower and the other is the one who put the money into the hands of the borrower acting for its own account — or for a disclosed third party lender. In most cases the creditor in that transaction is not named as the lender on the promissory note. Hence the age-old “merger doctrine” does not apply.

This practice allows the sale and resale of the same loan multiple times to multiple parties. This practice is also designed to allow the underwriter to issue investors a promise to pay (the “certificate” from a nonexistent inactive trust entity) that conveys no interest in the underlying mortgages and notes that supposedly are being acquired.

It’s true that equitable and perhaps legal rights to the paper (i.e., ownership) have attached to the paper. But the paper has been severed from the debt. Courts have inappropriately ignored this fact and stuck with the presumption that the paper is the same as the debt. But that would only be true if the named payee or mortgagee (or beneficiary on a Deed of Trust) were one and the same. In the real world, they are not the same. Thus we parties who don’t own the debt foreclosing on houses because the real parties in interest have no idea how to identify the real parties in interest.

While the UCC addresses situations like this Courts have routinely ignored statutory law and simply applied their own “common sense” to a nearly incomprehensible situation. The result is that the courts apply legal presumptions of facts that are wrong.

PRACTICE NOTE: In order to be able to litigate properly one must understand the basics of fake securitization. Without understanding the difference between real world transactions and paper instruments discovery and trial narrative become corrupted and the homeowner loses. But if you keep searching for things that ought to exist but don’t — thus undercutting the foundation for testimony at deposition or trial — then your chances of winning rise geometrically. The fact is, as I said in many interviews and on this blog as far back as 2007, they don’t have the goods — all they have is an illusion — a holographic image of an empty paper bag.

DEUTSCH BANK Memo Reveals Documents and Policies Ripe for Discovery

This completely corroborates what I have been saying for years along with a chorus of lawyers and pro se litigants across the county. It simply is not true that the attorney represents the trust or the trustee. 

This “Advisory” shows that there are documents that are rarely in the limelight and that clarify claims of securitization in practice. Note that the memorandum cited below comes from Deutsch Bank National Trust Company, as trustee and Deutsch Bank Trust Company Americas, as trustee.

These names are often NOT used when foreclosure actions are initiated where the name of the alleged REMIC Trustee is Deutsch Bank. It is important to note that neither of the two trust entities actually have been entrusted with any loans on behalf of any trust. Their name is used, for a fee, as windows dressing.

In this memo, Deutsch is attempting to limit its liability beyond the absence of any duties or trustee powers whose absence is revealed by reading the Pooling and Servicing Agreement (PSA) which is the alleged Trust instrument.

Let us help you plan your discovery requests: 202-838-6345
Get a consult and TEAR (Title & Encumbrances Analysis and & Report) 202-838-6345. The TEAR replaces and greatly enhances the former COTA (Chain of Title Analysis, including a one page summary of Title History and Gaps).
https://www.vcita.com/v/lendinglies to schedule CONSULT, leave message or make payments. It’s better than calling!
THIS ARTICLE IS NOT A LEGAL OPINION UPON WHICH YOU CAN RELY IN ANY INDIVIDUAL CASE. HIRE A LAWYER.
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Hat tip to Bill Paatalo

See Deutsche Bank Memorandum – July 2008

I have previously published and commented on parts of this memorandum. This is an expansion on my comments. This “advisory” obviously intends to bring alleged servicers back in line because it states in the introductory paragraph that the Trustee respectfully requests that all servicers review the First Servicing Memorandum and adhere to the practices it describes.”

None of this would have been necessary if the servicers were conforming to the directions and restrictions contained in the First Servicing Memorandum. We all know now that they were not conforming to anything or accepting instruction from anyone other than the alleged “Master Servicers” for NEITs (nonexistent  inactive trusts).

In discovery, one should ask for any servicer memoranda that exist including but not limited to the Memorandum to Securitization Loan Servicers dated August 30, 2007 a/k/a the First Servicer Memorandum, and all subsequent correspondence or written directions to servicers including but not limited to this “Advisory Concerning Servicing Issues Affecting Securitized Housing Assets.

Note also the oblique reference to the fact that the cut-off date actually means something.  It states that “typically” the REMICs (actually NEITs) take ownership of loans at the time the securitization trusts are formed. Thus discovery would include questions as to whether or not that occurred and if not, when did transfer of ownership occur and with what parties. Also one would ask for correspondence and agreements attendant to the alleged “transaction” in which the Trust allegedly purchased the loans with trust money that came from the proceeds of sales of certificates to investors. If the Trust did not pay value for the loans then it did not acquire the debt. It only acquired the paper instruments that are used as evidence of the debt.

Perhaps most importantly, the memo comes down hard on the use of powers of attorney, which are a favorite medium through which lawyers for the foreclosing parties typically try to patch obvious gaps in the chain of ownership or custody of the loan documents.

Then the memo provides foreclosure defense attorneys with the opportunity to attack the foundation laid for testimony and exhibits from robo-witnesses. It states that all parties must “Understand the mechanics of of relevant securitization transactions and related custodial practices in sufficient details to address such questions in a timely and accurate manner.” As any foreclosure defense lawyer will tell you, the robo-witness knows nothing about “the mechanics of of relevant securitization transactions and related custodial practices.” [The problem is that most borrowers and foreclosure defense lawyers don’t know either].

The inability of the robo-witness to describe the specific securitization practices in real life as it pertains to the subject loan gives rise to a cogent attack on the foundation for the rest of his testimony. With proper objections, perhaps motions in limine, and cross examination, this could lead to a defensive motion to strike the witnesses testimony and exhibits for lack of foundation. The following quote takes this out of the realm of theory and argument and into simple fact:

Servicers must ensure that loss mitigation personnel and professionals engaged by servicers, including legal counsel retained by servicers, understand the mechanics of relevant securitization transactions and related custodial practices in sufficient details to address such questions in a timely and accurate manner. In particular, servicing professionals [including “loss mitigation”] must become sufficiently familiar with the terms of the relevant securitization documents for each Trust for which they act to explain, and where necessary, prove those terms and resulting ownership interests to courts and government agencies.”

Note the assumption that lawyers are hired by servicers and not the Trustee or the Trust. Thus the servicers hire counsel and then order that foreclosure be brought in the name of the alleged trust. But if there is no trust or no acquisition of the debt, or authorization (remember powers of attorneys are not sufficient), the servicer is without legal authority to do anything, much less collect money from homeowners or bring foreclosure actions.

Paragraph (2) of the this “advisory” also gives guidance and foundation for what various people, especially attorneys, can say about who they represent and how.

“The Trustee believes that all persons retained by the servicer should specifically role or capacity in which they are acting. … One would be less accurate… if he or she claimed to be … attorney for the Trustee. A more accurate statement [attorney for servicer] acting for [Deutsch] as trustee of the Trust.”

This completely corroborates what I have been saying for years along with a chorus of lawyers and pro se litigants across the county. It simply is not true that the attorney represents the trust or the trustee.

 

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