I just finished doing an investigation for a client in Tampa, Florida who got taken for $3500 by shady loan modification company in California.  You can see the report in the articles section over at www.mfi-modsquad.com and tomorrow on CNBC.  The guy who conned them was Chris Campbell of Lionstar Financial who claimed to be an affiliate of Green Credit Solutions.  I had to do some digging after Brian LaRuffa and Curt Melone at Green Credit Solutions gave me a lot of double talk, offered me not so subtle bribes and phoney promises of mortgage fraud files for MFI-Miami.   I dug through all the bull (which was pretty deep) and worked my way through all the smoke and mirrors when I was able to piece this all together.

Chris Campbell owns an LLC in California named Lionstar Financial.  He worked out of the same office as Debra Sugden who claims to own Sueno Financial.  I know they worked at the same office because she signed for the certified letter I sent Chris Campbell and Lionstar.   Neither one of these companies is licensed through California DRE to do mods, mortgages or real estate in California.  According to Green Credit Solutions, Sueno is a broker affiliate.  Sueno Financial is not only not licensed through DRE, they are not even a registered business in California.   This now leads us to Green Credit Solutions who charges $3495 upfront for their loss mitigation work.   There are two problems with this, first their fee agreements have not been approved by DRE which violates DRE guidelines and second, part of this fee according to their contract, is a retainer for an attorney which is a violation of California Business And Professions Code Section 6152.  It’s a big no-no for a third party to collect retainers or solicit clients for an attorney in California.   The excuse both Brian LaRuffa and Curt Melone gave was priceless, “We don’t have to be licensed by DRE because we are attorney backed so we answer to the state bar.”

I then asked if they were attorneys and they said, “No”

I will give them credit, they did try to really hard to convince me they were right.  Guess what, boys? If you are not attorneys you need to follow DRE guidelines.

When I first contacted Green Credit Solutions, Brian LaRuffa claimed Chris Campbell and Lionstar were affiliates, then a few days later, I get a call from Curt Melone pretending to want my services as a forensic mortgage auditor and he can bring me all kinds of business because advertises on ML-Implode (a website for mortgage brokers) before he tells me who he is.  The conversation switches to my client and this whole sad affair when he tells me Chris Campbell was not an affiliate but they were looking for him as well because he stole a stack of their client agreements and was passing them out all over California.    I tell him I have to speak to my client and then he says, “I hope we can get this settled soon so I can send you business!”

After listening to their back pedalling and used car salesman tactics.  I finally told them I was going to make this an article for the site.  They naturally threatened to sue me.  Like threatening me with legal action has ever worked for anyone.