How “servicer advances” advance the false premise of securitization of loans.

Since the times of ancient Greece and even before that, it has been a commonly used statement that before discussion of an issue each party should precisely define their terms. The obvious conclusion has been that without agreed definitions, it is highly probable that each side is talking about something different and making no point in the debate. Every generation since then has agreed with that premise.

This is exactly what is happening in the world of finance. Wall Street has its own definitions that are never disclosed to the marketplace, consumers, investors, the courts or government regulators.

Each of those entities or people have their own definitions  based upon partial information and mostly blind faith in certain facts that appear to be axiomatically true. even the Federal reserve under the venerated Alan Greenspan made that error.

Wall Street capitalizes on that assymetric information to create a completely illegal place for itself in the economy — that of disguised principal while everyone else thinks they are merely acting in their assigned and proper role as broker.

What I find fascinating is the meaning of securitization of servicing advances. Remember that securitization means, by definition and by law, that an asset or group of assets has been sold for value to multiple investors in exchange for pro rata ownership of those assets. That is the essence of all securitization, including IPOs and existing common stock traded on national or international security exchange services or platforms.

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Analyzing the data published by the firms promoting “securitization,” we see that no “loan” or debt has ever been purchased and sold by a grantor who owned the underlying obligation or a grantee who paid any value. “Securitization” exists — but not for the paper or the money trail (payments and collections). The securities issued are based upon a discretionary unsecured promise to make indefinite payments to buyers of certificates issued by the promisor (securities brokerage firm).
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The terms of payments from securities brokerage firms to investors who purchased certificates have no direct relationship to the terms of payments scheduled from homeowners, who are unaware that the sale of the securities resulting from their signatures greatly exceeds the amount of their transaction, leaving a zero balance due and quite possibly opening the door for a claim for greater compensation as the essential party making the securitization scheme possible. This is discussed at length on my blog.
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The securitization scheme has many subplots. One of them is “servicer advances.” A real servicer advance is one in which the company designated as the servicer receives, processes, accounts, and distributes money to the investors.
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To my knowledge and my proprietary database, there is not one existing scenario that conforms to that description. In plain terms, servicers do not make advances mainly because they do not pay investors — ever. And as I have previously discussed on this blog, they don’t receive payments either.
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So these falsely labeled “servicers” can’t and don’t create data entries reflecting the receipt of payments — but law firms seeking foreclosure argue or imply that they do receive such payments and that their “records” are business records — i.e., records of business conducted by the designated “servicer” who in fact performs no servicing duties.
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The true meaning of a servicer advance under the current schemes of securitization claims is that some of the money paid to investors is labeled as a servicer advance even though the servicer paid nothing and had no duty to pay the investors anything (just like the homeowner had no duty to pay anything because securitization sales had eliminated the debt).
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That duty (to pay investors) was reserved for the promisor, who we will remember is a securities brokerage company that is not a “servicer.” The label “servicer advance” comes from the reports issued (fabricated) by the company designated as “Master Servicer,” showing that some scheduled homeowner payments have not been paid or received. This disregards the obvious premise that there is no payment due.
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The reader should understand that the sole reason investors would be paid regardless of the number or amount of incoming scheduled payments from homeowners is that the securities firm wants to keep selling unregulated securities (certificates). That is the point of the securitization scheme —- to sell securities.
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While incoming payments from homeowners are a partial basis for payments to investors, the promise requires that new securities from new securitization schemes are being sold, producing revenues and the ability to say that certain “tranches” (that contain nothing) are “over-collateralized.”
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The reader should also understand that the fact that homeowners are making payments is the sole factual support — in law and, in fact — that payments are due. In a twisted way, homeowners, through their ignorance of the actual events in which they are key players, are playing an active role in deceiving each other, the government, investors, and the courts.
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The promissory note and mortgage role in this scenario are strictly symbolic. But they do raise the legal presumption that they are valid documents if they are facially valid according to the state statute. Nonetheless, the real reason anyone believes that payments are due when they’re not due is that homeowners make the scheduled payments to anyone who commands them to do so.
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So the fact that the investors received their promised payment from the securities firm that controls the scheme (but does not own anything) is why they call it an “advance. The idea that it came from a “Servicer” is just a fabrication to imply that a third party was involved. But that is enough to raise the facial presumption from the self-serving documentation and claims prepared by the securities firm or on its behalf.
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The prospectus for each securitization plan reveals the plot to claim “servicer advances” by labeling money not paid by homeowners (whether due or not) as a “servicer advance.” The prospectus shows that a fictional reserve account is created by selling certificates containing the investors’ money.
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The prospectus discloses that investors would receive payments from a reserve pool, which is disclosed as a return of the money the investor paid. But that is exactly the money amount used to claim “servicer advances.” The reserve account may actually exist in some securitization schemes. Still, the “reserve account” is completely controlled by the securities brokerage firm that served as the bookrunner underwriter of the securities (certificates offered for sale).
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And the money proceeds of the sale of derivatives (more unregulated securities traded in the shadow banking marketplace) based on the “servicer advances” go to the investment bank, not the servicer. This is yet another way to reduce any hypothetical (fictional) loan account below a zero balance.
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Since the investors have contractually agreed to that arrangement, the fact that it is not an advance and only a return of capital make no legal difference. So they are converting false declarations of homeowner “defaults” into saleable assets, thus creating the foundation for securitization of false claims of “servicer advances.”
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As you can see from the above explanation, the answers to almost every question dealing with securitization of debt are extremely convoluted. In fact, the vice president of asset management for Deutsche Bank described it as “counterintuitive.” The reason that it is counterintuitive is that it doesn’t make any sense, once you break it down into its component pieces.
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The big stumbling block for everyone is the fact that money appears to have been paid to or paid on behalf of the homeowner. It is therefore assumed as axiomatically true that the money reported to have been paid to the homeowner or paid on behalf of the homeowner must have been alone, if for no other reason than the fact that the homeowner executed a note and mortgage and then started paying.
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 But even that apparent reality is not true in most cases. Nearly all existing transactions that have been labeled as mortgage loan transactions are directly or indirectly the product of supplemental securitization schemes.
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That is to say that most of such transactions consist entirely of reports of payments that never occurred. To the extent that such transactions were presented as paying off a previously classified mortgage loan transaction, such reports were entirely untrue in most cases.
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As long as both transactions resulted from a controlled securitization scheme by a common securities brokerage firm acting as the book runner underwriter of certificates offered for sale to investors, there was no need to transfer any money. Our investigation has revealed the absence of any evidence ingesting that any such money was transferred.  This raises a basic defense for homeowners: lack of consideration and breach of the alleged contract.
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 If the homeowner received, for example, $30,000 from the “refinancing” of the property, but signed a note for $500,000, based upon the false premises of a payoff of the previous “mortgage loan,” the consideration for the note and the mortgage is either completely absent or at least mostly absent.
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 What most people do not understand is that the “refinancing” was just an opportunity to start another controlled securitization scheme with the new set of securities being sold without the retirement of the old securitization scheme or those securities.
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PRACTICE NOTE: The presence of servicer advances described in the prospectus and pooling and servicing agreement provides a foundation for the homeowner’s defense based on standing. Since servicer advances have priority in the liquidation of property, the outcome of foreclosure results in payment to the investment bank rather than the designated creditor. Proper discovery and objections at trial are likely to successfully undermine the most basic element of the claim: legal standing.
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There is a false premise implied in “servicer advances” that leads to false conclusions. The false premise is that the money is owed to the “Master Servicer,” and the debt is that of the investors on whose behalf the advances were presumably made. The fact that there were no such advances remains concealed, and the fact that the investors have absolutely no liability to the recipient of the “servicer advances” is also concealed. But this false premise that is always implied if the subject comes up, is usually sufficient to convince a judge that servicer advances are irrelevant. Upon proper scrutiny and analysis, the subject of servicer advances are highly relevant and even dispositive of the entire claim.

SPS and the Chase Servicer Shell Game

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

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Many Judges have expressed their concern about the constant movement of servicers and trustees. They are asking why the servicer keeps changing and why the trustees are changing. And now they are asking for legal argument why the substitution of the only named Plaintiff is not an amendment to the Complaint which must specifically allege facts in support of the claim of the “new Plaintiff.” This is a result of the multifaceted fraudulent scheme where claims of securitization are unfounded and claims of debt are fictitious — in derogation of the rights of both investors on Wall Street and borrowers on main Street.

Taking an example from one case being litigated now, we have a fact pattern where WAMU was the “lender” in the purchase money mortgage. Chase steps in and refinances the loan. Long after these events and long after the “default” was declared by Chase, SPS is said to be the servicer, not Chase. This successor entity is thus the party whose corporate representative is brought to trial to testify. The witness admits to having no direct personal knowledge and has no job other than testifying. The witness has no knowledge nor employment history with Chase, WAMU or the Trust or Trustee (usually US BANK where Chase is involved). The borrower, despite encouragement to take more money on refinancing, elected only to get enough money to make repairs due to storm damage. They received $45,000 in this example.

This is an issue which is slowly dawning on me that could shake things up considerably. Whether we use it or not is a different story.

It might mean that the real loan was only $45k — in total. That would affect the collections on the loan, which could have paid off the actual loan in its entirety, as well as the validity of the declaration of default and the truth of the matters asserted in the judicial complaint or the notice of non-judicial default and notice of sale. Specifically the “reinstatement” figure or “redemption” figure might actually be a negative figure — money due from the parties stating that they are the creditors, which claim they can hardly deny since they are pursuing foreclosure.

LOAN #1 was with WAMU. WAMU according to the FDIC receiver had sold the loans into the secondary market for securitization. This was the purchase money mortgage. So at some point before the refinancing in LOAN#2 the purchase money loan was sold into the secondary market. Thus WAMU only had servicing rights — if the “purchaser” entered into an agreement for WAMU to service the loan. In the case where the loan is subject to securitization, the “purchaser” is a REMIC Trust. But it appears as though few, if any, of the REMIC Trusts ever achieved the status of the owner of the debt, holder in due course, or owner of the mortgage or note. While it is possible to start a lawsuit to collect on the note, that lawsuit can never be resolved in favor of the Plaintiff unless the maker of the note defaults.

LOAN#2 was with Chase. This was supposedly a refinancing. The loan closing documents show that WAMU was paid and WAMU issued the satisfaction of mortgage and did not return the old note cancelled.

WAMU usually retained servicing rights so it would be claimed that WAMU had every right to collect the money and issue the satisfaction. But the servicing rights only existed if LOAN#1 actually made it into a Trust. If not, the loan was NOT subject to the Pooling and Servicing Agreement. If WAMU — or Chase as successor or SPS as successor are actually the servicers, it MUST therefore be by virtue of some other document. That is why we are seeing some rather strange Powers of Attorney and other “enabling” documents appear out of nowhere in which the issues are further confused.

The borrowers received $45k which was for roof repairs from storm damage. So the borrowers did receive  $45k presumably from Chase, but not necessarily as we have already seen, where the originator, even if it was a big bank was using money from an illegally formed pool outside of the REMIC Trust that the investors thought was getting the money from the proceeds of sale of mortgage backed securities.

So the witness probably has absolutely no access to information and therefore no testimony about whether LOAN#1 got paid off. And in fact it is most likely that WAMU was either paid or not depending upon internal agreements with Chase. And the witness can only testify using hearsay about the preceding records of Chase, US Bank and WAMU. Several trial judges have refused to accept such testimony saying directly that the witness and the company represented by the witness are too far removed from the actual transactions to have any credibility as to the authenticity or accuracy of the business records of other entities and that the SPS records are simply an attempt to get around the hearsay rules without exposing the predecessors to direct discovery and questioning where the answers would either be embarrassing or perjury.

If WAMU was paid in the refinancing (proceeds from LOAN#2) the wrong party was paid and the debt still exists unless Chase can show that the real creditor was paid off. It is unlikely they can show that because it probably is not true. Chase was hiding the default status of loans, as we have seen in Matt Taibbi’s story in Rolling Stone. The reason was simple — the more it  looked like these Mortgage backed Securities were performing as expected, the more the investors were inclined to buy more mortgage bonds — and that is where the bulk of the money is for Chase.

By selling loans at 100 cents on the dollar (Par Value) when the true value might only have been 1/10th that amount, the profit was enormous and it all went to Chase (not the investors whose money was used to start the string of transactions in the first place).

The witness will not be able to say that WAMU was definitely paid, and if it was paid, whether the money was paid to the real creditor. This is probably a primary reason why SPS was inserted between Chase and the foreclosure proceedings. It is also why they are attempting to rely on the business records of SPS instead of the business records of Chase.

SPS is usually inserted AFTER all events have occurred relating to the debt, note, mortgage, “default,” and foreclosure. Using a witness from SPS is, on its face, allowing a witness with zero personal knowledge about anything to verify records of other companies whose records the witness has never seen.

This is done to camouflage the actual events — wherein the money from investors was stolen or diverted from its intended target (REMIC Trust) and then used to fund loans in the name of a naked nominee whose interest in the loan was only that of a vendor whose name was being rented to withhold disclosure of the real creditor, the compensation received, and the identity of all the real parties who were getting paid as a result of the “loan origination.”

This is a direct conflict with TILA, requiring that disclosure and Reg Z which states that such a loan is “predatory per se.” If the loan is predatory per se it might be “unclean hands” per se which would mean that the mortgage could never enforced even if the consideration was present.

Banks Throw $20 Billion at Securitized Debt Market to Avoid Markdowns

Bloomberg Reports that the big banks are borrowing big time money using money market funds as source money for financing repurchase agreements. This stirs the obvious conclusion that the mortgage bonds — and hence the claim on underlying loans — are in constant movement making the proof problems in foreclosure proceedings difficult at best.

The underlying theme is that there is tremendous pressure to make good on the mortgage bonds that never actually existed issued by REMIC trusts that were never actually funded who made claims on loans that never actually existed. All that is why I say you should argue away from the presumption and keep the burden of persuasion or burden of proof on the party who has exclusive access to the actual proof of payment and proof of loss.

The banks are still claiming assets on their balance sheet that are either without value of any kind or something close to zero. If I was wrong about this, the banks would be flooding all the courts with proof of payment (canceled check, wire transfer receipt etc) and the contest with borrowers would be over.

Instead they argue for the presumption that attaches to the “holder” and mislead the court into thinking that possession is the same as being the holder. It isn’t. The holder is someone who acquired the instrument “for value.” By denying the holder status and contesting whether there was any consideration for the endorsement or assignment of the loan, you are putting them in position to force them to come clean and show that there was NO consideration, NO money paid, and hence they are not holders in any sense of the word.

If you research the law in your state you will find that the prima facie case required from the would-be forecloser depends factually upon whether they are an injured party. If they didn’t pay anything for the origination or transfer of the loan, they can’t be an injured party. They must also show that their injury stems from the breach of the borrower and the breach of some intermediary. That is where the repurchase agreements and financing for all those purchases comes into the picture.

So far the banks have been largely successful in using bootstrap reasoning that a possessor is a holder and a holder is therefore a holder in due course by operation of the presumptions arising from the Uniform Commercial Code. And since normally a presumption shifts the burden to the other side (the borrower in this case) to come up with legally admissible evidence that the facts do not support the presumption, the borrower or borrower’s counsel sits there in the courtroom stumped.

Further research, however, will show that if the facts needed to prove the presumption to be unsupported by facts are in the sole care, custody and control of the claiming party, you are entitled to conduct discovery and that means they must come up with the actual cancelled check, wire transfer receipt, wire transfer instructions etc. The would-be forecloser cannot block discovery by asserting the presumption arising from their own self-serving allegation of holder status.

In this case the presumption arising from the allegation that the would-be forecloser is a “holder” is defeated by mere denial because it is ONLY the would-be forecloser that has access to the the actual proof of payment and proof of loss. I remind you again that the debt is not the note and the note is not the mortgage. They are all separate issues.

This is becoming painfully obvious as reports are coming in from across the country indicating that courts at all levels and legislatures are under intense pressure to find a loophole through which the mega banks can escape the truth, to wit: that they are holding worthless paper and that the only transaction that ever actually occurred was the one between the investors and the borrowers without either  of those parties in interest being aware of the slight of hand pulled by the banks. The banks diverted the money invested by pension funds from the REMIC trusts into their own pockets. The banks diverted the documents that would have solidified the interest of the investors in those loans to themselves.

And let there be no mistake that the banks planned the whole thing out ahead of time. The only reason why MERS and other private label title databases were necessary was to hide the fact that the banks were trading the investments made by pension funds as if they were their own. Otherwise there would have been no reason to have anyone’s name on the note or mortgage other than the asset pool designated as a REMIC trust.

These exotic instruments are being tested by the marketplace and they are failing miserably. So the banks are throwing tens of billions of dollars to refinance the repurchase of the derivatives that were worthless in the first place. It’s worth it to them to retain the trillions of dollars they are claiming as assets that are unsupported by any actual monetary transactions. AND THAT is why in the final analysis, after they have beaten you to a pulp in court, if you are still standing, you get some amazing offers of settlement that actually are still fractions of a cent on the dollar.

Banking giants lead repo funding of securitized debt
http://www.housingwire.com/fastnews/2013/04/16/banking-giants-lead-repo-funding-securitized-debt

Housing Recovery Barred by Foreclosure Inventory PLUS New Sellers

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Editor’s Comment:

Crowd mentality is a double edged sword. On the way up in the boom, the myth was that the inflated prices were somehow explainable or justified and that the “real estate market never goes down.” history shows that housing prices always even off at housing VALUE and that deviation from value is what we call “prices.”

On the way down, the fall of housing prices could be and was easily predicted by reference tothe Case Schiller Index tying median income (the ability to pay for housing) with housing prices. The value of homes had remained the same while prices skyrocketed because Wall street had flooded the market with money and hired anyone willing to lie in order to close another loan deal.

Remember that 50% of the loan deals were refinancing. That had nothing to do with new purchases bigger than the pocket books of the buyers. These were people solicited by the banks with tag lines “I can reduce your payments” and I can get you money you can use for investing.

Many deals were new financing on older homes that were fully paid for on the promise of securities scames (see Merendon Mining) where the lenders posing as banks (but at the bank’s behest, holding trillions that investment banks collected from pension funds and other “qualified” investors) not only validated the illegal investment Ponzi scheme, but actually used PROJECTED INCOME from the Ponzi scheme to justify the loan making it appear that the inčome from the PROJECTED INVESTMENT PROCEEDS OF THE UNNEEDED LOANS was in fact to be counted as current income and therefore demonstrating the ability of a borrower to pay when the actual current income was a small fraction of the total income of the borrower reported by lying loan originators and mortgage brokers on the loan “applications” where the loan was both pre-approved and pre-funded.

There was no rush of buyers to flatten out the curve of declining prices because everyone knew the market was črashing. The masses were headed for the doors. Under the spectre of inventories of foreclosure properties (illegally obtained through false “credit bids” and robo-signed deeds on forclosure) and shadow foreclosure inventories (not yet put up for sale) only those with inescapable “reasons” were buying homes. The demographic explanations of demand for new housing demand that fueled the construction of new homes was all based upon lies. Migrations of large numbers of people into an area simply never happened and could therefore neither explain the housing boom nor stop the crash because it was all a myth.

In the article below, the further point is made that when the market actually shows signs of recovery — a long way off — many private sellers will be eyeing numbers they think are closer to their perception of value of their homes. Thus any upward movement is going to be met with a torrent of new inventory from both the banks and private ownership. For every blip that makes it appear that the market is improving, there will be a correction.

Housing Recovery a Long Way Off

By Michael Yoshikami

Housing starts were surprisingly strong this week, while there was improving sentiment from home builders. So should we start to breathe a sigh of relief that the housing market is returning to health? The short answer is no. The headlines say that housing is stabilizing and there are signs of life in the real estate sector. This is true but is only part of the story. Signs of life is far different than a return to healthier times.

While KB Homes and Toll Brothers are reporting sales increases, this does not erase the fundamental problem with the real estate market today; there are too many people wanting to sell and not enough buyers. In some neighborhoods in the United States, every other house is for sale and sitting stagnant with no takers. But this is the obvious sign that the real estate market is troubled; there are deeper problems below the surface.

What is more troubling is in every block in neighborhoods across the United States, there are huge numbers of potential sellers that would sell their house if they could get the price they believe their house is worth. This huge reserve of sellers creates a supply waiting to flood the market when any sign of recovery in real estate capital values returns.

Additionally, banks continue to hold huge inventories of foreclosed properties waiting for a rebound in the market before placing these properties into the real estate market. …

In addition to supply issues, the U.S. economy is far from healthy. While we are in the midst of an uneven recovery, unemployment remains stubbornly high and the prospects of a more normalized employment rate are far off in the distance.


ROBOSIGNING IN RESALES AND REFINANCING: MASSIVE TITLE PROBLEM

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In reviewing the title chain going back further than the current homeowner in foreclosure, I discovered some familiar names, like Linda Green, who signed a satisfaction of mortgage on one deal that was “refinanced.” Up until now, we have been focused strictly on the current customer who is the current homeowner or last person to own the property before it was sold at “auction” for a “credit bid.”

The reason we limit our search to a specific loan (which is why it is called a loan specific title search) is that going back further takes a lot more time and work, it is more expensive, and the Judges wrinkle their noses at the prospect of dredging up old transactions in which the homeowner in front of them was not a party. But like it or not, these findings indicate that Judges are going to need to take a close look at issues, if they are presented to the Judge, when there is a question of clear title back before the current homeowner got involved.

Based upon my sampling, it would appear that the use of “surrogate signors” (robosigners) was pandemic in the processing of transactions in which there was a sale of a home or refinancing of a home in which the “old” mortgage was replaced by a “new” mortgage. It makes sense since the old originator was often not even in existence at the time of the new transaction.

The “old” mortgage appears to be signed in many cases by a party that is a known robosigning name, in which it is doubtful that that Linda Green signed the document, doubtful that whoever did sign the satisfaction of mortgage on the “old” loan ever had the authority to do so, or ever knew what they were signing.

It gets worse. If the sampling is correct, then that means the payoff on the “old” mortgage went to the wrong party and the entity that signed the satisfaction of mortgage (or release and reconveyance in non-judicial states) was also the wrong party. That means there is a giant hole, not just a break, in the chain of title. It also means that for those who entered into such transactions, they might think they only have one mortgage, but they might have two or more mortgages that remain unsatisfied in their title chain.

The title companies are well aware of this issue, based upon my interviews with people who are in the title business, including the head of one title company. Whose obligation is it to clear the title and when should the effort be made to clear the title? Normally the industry practice is to take care of title problems as soon as they are discovered to avoid consequential financial damages to the homeowner when it comes time to resell or refinance the property. This process could take years of litigation. The old title policies don’t contain exclusions for securitization claims, so you can apply pressure to them to clear up the problem. But I already know that the line they are going to use is that “we did not insure that risk.”

The buyers of foreclosed properties should look carefully at the title policy they are receiving. It is almost guaranteed that the title policy excludes the risks outlined in this article. You need to argue for removal of those exclusions from the commitment and the policy. It is unfortunately necessary to check on the title company and order your own title search from someone who understands about robosigning, title, and securitization. Going back to previous owners is more expensive than the usual loan specific title search we do. So we are working up a service that fulfills this need in the least expensive way possible.

In the meanwhile, if you want your title policy analyzed by one of our experts, you can write to neilfgarifeld@hotmail.com and you will be given a quote for the work to be done. It will include a title search going back in time to as far as the 1990’s and an analysis of the documents of record to detect any potential problems in the title chain caused by claims of securitization. Your attorney, if you have one, should be questioned before you enter into any of these transactions. If he or she is unfamiliar with the issues of robosigning, securitization and fabricated documents, you made need to search for someone who does understand it.


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