Romney says banking reform hurting housing market in Florida

May 21, 2012 By Steve Dibert Leave a Comment

Adam C. Smith, Tampa Bay times

More than four in 10 Florida homeowners are underwater on their mortgages. President Barack Obamahas not done much to help them, and it doesn’t sound like Mitt Romney has any serious plan in store either. His main idea? Repeal Wall Street reform.

“Bankers have been very slow in renegotiating the mortgages, helping people go through the process, short sales and so forth that allow these products, these homes, to be taken out of the market so they can be bought by new investors,” Romney said in a Political Connections interview airing today on Bay News 9.

“Government has made it harder for the banks to do it. The Dodd-Frank (Wall Street) legislation has scared particularly community banks in such a way that they’re just paralyzed. They’re not taking action to help people get their mortgages renegotiated and let people either stay in their home or have the home ultimately go back in the hands of new investors that will turn it around and ultimately bring home values back up.”

Check out the full interview at 11 a.m. and 8 p.m. on Bay News 9.

Deputy Gets Fired For Lying About Income On Mortgage App In 2007

May 19, 2012 By Steve Dibert Leave a Comment

JPMorgan Chase Not Pursuing Charges

Steve Dibert, MFI-Miami

Call me a cynic or maybe it’s just because I know more about the mortgage industry than most people but something doesn’t add up about the story that appeared the local news in Naples yesterday. It was about Collier County Sheriff’s Deputy, Michael Kovar being terminated for lying about his income on a mortgage application he filled out back in 2007 for a house he wanted to buy and flip. He claimed his income from his side business of flipping homes was an additional $510,000 a year when in reality it was $88,000. The house later went into default with a $500,000 deficiency. After the foreclosure process was completed, JPMorgan Chase stated they were not going to pursue the deficiency.

Soon after, the Collier County Sheriff’s Department began digging through Michael Kovar’s finances for an undisclosed reason and discovered his mortgage application and in March of this year Kovar for “unlawful or improper conduct” and “failing to pay just debts.”

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not condoning Michael Kovar for misrepresenting his income on his mortgage application and he should be punished. However, unlike most cases where homeowners get caught misrepresenting their income, lenders are more than eager to convict but in this case especially on a loan this size but JPMorgan Chase refuses to. Why?

According to WINK News, JPMorgan Chase took a $500,000 loss on the property but did they? It may appear that way on the public record but as anyone who follows my blogs knows, looks can be deceiving. JPMorgan Chases says they’re not pursuing Michael Kovar for the deficiency. Did they really take a $500,000 loss on the file? Probably not. There are two probable reasons why Chase isn’t pursuing this. The loan was insured and JPMorgan Chase got paid off by the insurance policy or they felt that if the matter was litigated they couldn’t prove enough of an ownership interest in the note and/or mortgage under Florida law to legally foreclose. So that begs the question, is this debt legitimate?

The Collier County Sheriff’s office is sophisticated enough to know this. Michael Kovar’s termination sounds more like a case of the department wanting to terminate his employment using this as an excuse.

Filed Under: Florida, Mortgage News, Steve's Blog Tagged With: Collier County Sheriff's Deputy Michael Kovar, defaulted loans, economic meltdown, financial crisis, Florida Bankers Association, florida foreclosure fraud, florida foreclosure mill law firms, Florida foreclosure mills, Florida Foreclosure Mitigation, florida foreclosures, Florida Supreme Court, foreclosure, foreclosure cases, foreclosure crisis, foreclosure defense, foreclosure filings, foreclosure fraud, foreclosure help, foreclosure help florida, foreclosure mediation, foreclosure mills, foreclosure rescue, foreclosures, Housing Crisis, illegal foreclosures, JPMorgan Chase, mortgage backed securities, Mortgage Crisis, mortgage fraud, mortgage help, mortgages, South Florida home prices

Like The Missing Kiszka, Note Goes Missing

May 16, 2012 By Steve Dibert Leave a Comment

…And The Lawyers Want It Back!

Kimberly Miller, Palm Beach Post

A suburban West Palm Beach foreclosure case has even bank employees confused, with internal emails that question whether the wrong entity is repossessing the house – but that then decide to move forward anyway.

Bank attorneys now want to purge the court file with the messages, which were filed mistakenly. The emails also mention trying to avoid mounting community association fees.

“I think the emails basically say the plaintiff doesn’t own the loan, and it belongs to a different lender,” said attorney Peter Snyder, who is representing Abby Lopez. “It may be Bank of America, or Bank of America could just be the servicer. That’s where it all gets crazy.”

Homeowner advocates say the three email exchanges exemplify one of their biggest concerns – that the wrong bank will take their home.

The concern arose when boom-time loans were repeatedly bundled or broken into pieces and sold by the original lender to trusts, investors or other lenders. As a result, a bank may be responsible for collecting payments and daily loan oversight, but not be the true owner.

The emails in Lopez’s case were filed in October with a sworn “affidavit of indebtedness” that details how much Lopez owes on the mortgage, and asserts that Bank of America is the servicer of the loan.

But Bank of America is not listed as a plaintiff in the case. HSBC Bank USA, “as trustee for the holders of Deutsche Alt-A Securities Mortgage Loan Trust, Series 2007-Bar1 Mortgage Pass-Through Certificates,” is the party named as foreclosing on the home.

Oy Vey! Wells Fargo Forecloses On Chabad of Boca Raton

May 14, 2012 By Steve Dibert Leave a Comment

Anne Geggis, Sun Sentinel

Wells Fargo bank is foreclosing on Chabad of Boca Raton — including its synagogue and preschool — for not paying on its $2 million mortgage since November, according to a lawsuit filed in Palm Beach County Circuit Court.

The 23-year-old Orthodox Jewish congregation has occupied its 3-acre campus at 17950 Military Trail since 1999.

Rabbi Moishe Denburg, leader of the congregation, and Michele Lenoff, its attorney, declined to comment.

Wells Fargo also wants the property put into receivership to keep it maintained. Attorneys and other representatives for Wells Fargo, suing the Friends of Chabad of Boca Raton, also declined to comment on the case beyond the filing.

It’s at least the third time in two years that a Chabad in Palm Beach County has been facing legal action for debts.

Rabbi Sholom Ciment, whose own congregation Chabad-Lubavitch of Boynton Beach filed for bankruptcy in 2010, said the issues are the same that are facing nonprofit organizations of all kinds. In February 2011, Chabad House-Lubavitch of Palm Beach closed its bankruptcy case, federal filings show.

Nonprofit organizations get into financial trouble when supporters don’t see their own situations improving, he said.

“This is not a Jewish issue, it’s not a synagogue issue. There have been all types of organizations in the last few years that have gone defunct and bankrupt,” he said. “It’s a whole lot more visible than any time that I can remember.”

Ciment said his congregation pulled together, was able to survive and is back on sound financial footing after facing bankruptcy.

But court filings show that Chabad of Boca Raton had the mortgage on its 23,112-square-foot facility modified five times since its original property loan. Wells Fargo is owed $2.1 million in the mortgage principal, interest, late fees and attorneys’ fees, records show.

Romney says banking reform hurting housing market in Florida

Deputy Gets Fired For Lying About Income On Mortgage App In 2007

JPMorgan Chase Not Pursuing Charges

Like The Missing Kiszka, Note Goes Missing

…And The Lawyers Want It Back!

Oy Vey! Wells Fargo Forecloses On Chabad of Boca Raton

Translation

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