WEEKEND EDITION, AUGUST 20 AUGUST 24, 2012

MONDAY, AUGUST 20, 2012

ACADEMIA ADVERSARIES ADVOCATES BLOGOSPHERE LEGAL LEGISLATE OP-ED HOMEOWNERS NEWS ForeclosureGate.org Is A Public Service Homeowner Coalition and Cooperative, Created To Exchange News And Information And To Advance Justice For American Homeowners

A Transactional Genealogy of Scandal: from Michael Milken to Enron to Goldman Sachs Three scandals have fundamentally reshaped business regulation over the past thirty years: the securities fraud prosecution of Michael Milken in 1988, the Enron implosion of 2001, and the Goldman Sachs Abacus enforcement action of 2010. The scandals have always been seen as unrelated. This Article highlights a previously unnoticed transactional affinity tying these scandals together

Washington Supreme Court Issues MERS Smackdown While MERS has served to illustrate the utter recklessness of the securitization industry, in that its promoters apparently believed that they could implement it nationwide and simply force state law to comply. But as the banks have found out, the law is not always so obliging. Today, Washington State, which is a non-judical foreclosure state, gave MERS a serious setback

Housing Recovery Narrative Surges Forward, But Reasons for Price Rise More Sinister So either prices went up, or prices went up by double! I guess its hard to say when you have no comprehensive data of the industry. I dont want to start sounding like a climate skeptic here. In fact, theres a pretty simple story to tell about why housing looks positive right now. Its embedded in Fannie Maes income report. Simply put, theyre able to sell more of their REO Real Estate Owned to investors.

Treasury to Amend Terms of Fannie, Freddie Bailout The Treasury Department will revamp the terms of its nearly four-year-old financial backing of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in a bid to allay investor concerns that the companies could one day exhaust their federal lifelines. The renegotiated agreements, announced Friday, change the way the firms pay the government for support and are designed to ensure.

Northern CA RE Investor Agrees to Plead Guilty to Bid Rigging at Public Foreclosure Auctions A Northern California real estate investor has agreed to plead guilty for her role in conspiracies to rig bids and commit mail fraud at public real estate foreclosure auctions in Northern California, the Department of Justice announced. Felony charges were filed today in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

CFPB proposes new rules for mortgage servicers The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau on Friday proposed new regulations that would revamp how American homeowners interact with mortgage servicers. One set of rules aims to provide homeowners with clearer, timelier information about changes to interest rates and options for avoiding foreclosure.

Did Capital One Target Deployed Soldiers for Foreclosure? Case in point: Last week, the Department of Justice wrapped up an investigation of Capital One (COF), in which it accused the bank of violating the rules of the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act -- specifically, rules that forbid: Charging more than 6% interest on loans and credit card debt incurred.

HUD Rolls Out New PSAs for $25B Servicer Settlement The Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the state attorney general who handled much of the negotiation leading to last spring's $25 billion settlement with mortgage servicers rolled out its first high visibility outcome on Thursday.

Colorado foreclosure filings up in July Colorado foreclosure filings were on the rise in July, up 14 percent from July 2011. According to a report released Tuesday by the Colorado Division of Housing, there were 1,976 foreclosure filings in July in Colorado's metropolitan counties compared to 1,733 in July 2011.

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WEEKEND EDITION, AUGUST 20 AUGUST 24, 2012

TUESDAY, AUGUST 21, 2012

ACADEMIA ADVERSARIES ADVOCATES BLOGOSPHERE LEGAL LEGISLATE OP-ED HOMEOWNERS NEWS ForeclosureGate.org Is A Public Service Homeowner Coalition and Cooperative, Created To Exchange News And Information And To Advance Justice For American Homeowners

Market manipulation is prohibited in the United States under Section 9(a)(2) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 Market manipulation is a deliberate attempt to interfere with the free and fair operation of the market and create artificial, false or misleading appearances with respect to the price of, or market for, a security, commodity or currency. Market manipulation is prohibited in the United States under Section 9(a)(2) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.

...may be intentionally holding back REO inventory from being listed A previous post addressed some of the more practical reasons that lenders may not be listing the majority of REO inventory on their books. While these practical impediments to listing REOs are more concrete and easier to grasp, two items in the most recent quarterly 10-Q SEC filing from Fannie Mae opens the possibility that lenders may be intentionally holding back.

Cautious Moves on Foreclosures Haunting Obama Mortgage companies, mostly owned by large banks, had ample resources to improve their treatment of troubled borrowers. But in the absence of any significant threat of punitive government action, they made little progress. Here we are looking at high levels of foreclosures on the horizon, looking at significant failures in process, and nothing much . Wall Street warns against using eminent domain to seize underwater mortgages With many areas of the country still digging out from the housing crisis, some local governments are considering taking on the underwater mortgages at a substantially lower price, thus making them more affordable for the borrower. With policymakers at the federal, state and local level struggling to find a way to relieve the burden of unaffordable home loans.

Trustee lawsuit

ReconTrust

settles

foreclosure

The Washington State Attorney General's Office has settled a case with a trustee company formerly doing business in Washington for failing to comply with the state's laws governing foreclosure trustees. In Washington state, foreclosure trustees are legally required to be neutral parties with local offices, available to borrowers during the foreclosure process.

National, state foreclosure starts on the rise More U.S. homes started on the foreclosure path in July, as lenders tackled a backlog of unpaid mortgages even as they pulled back on home repossession. The number of homes that received an initial notice of default the first step in the foreclosure process increased 6 percent in July.

Foreclosure bills advance from N.J. Senate Economic Growth Committee I believe the governor should reconsider this important legislation and have streamlined the process to hopefully address his concerns, said Senator Lesniak, D-Union. The foreclosure crisis in New Jersey is driving down residential property values, causing urban and suburban blight.

Foreclosed: Rehousing the American Dream Foreclosed: Rehousing the American Dream is an exploration of new architectural possibilities for cities and suburbs in the aftermath of the recent foreclosure crisis. During summer 2011, five interdisciplinary teams of architects, urban planners, ecologists, engineers, and landscape designers worked in public workshops at MoMA PS1.

Jill Stein Arrested: Green Party Nominee Faces Charges After Bank/Foreclosure Protest Green Party presidential nominee Jill Stein and her running mate have been arrested at a sit-in at a Philadelphia bank over housing foreclosures. Some tried to reach Fannie Mae's downtown office through the adjacent bank. They staged a sit-in when they were denied access to the office building.

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WEEKEND EDITION, AUGUST 20 AUGUST 24, 2012

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 22, 2012

ACADEMIA ADVERSARIES ADVOCATES BLOGOSPHERE LEGAL LEGISLATE OP-ED HOMEOWNERS NEWS ForeclosureGate.org Is A Public Service Homeowner Coalition and Cooperative, Created To Exchange News And Information And To Advance Justice For American Homeowners

Tracy Lawrence and the Foreclosure Suicide that America Ignored Despite the somewhat increased media attention given to these tragic stories nowadays, there is one suicide directly tied to foreclosure fraud that has been completely ignored by the media. Her name was Tracy Lawrence, and for a brief moment last year, between the moment she turned whistleblower and her untimely and bizarre suicide, Tracy Lawrences testimony threatened to blow the entire fraud-closure criminal enterprise wide open, with repercussions that could have easily reverberated all the way up to the major banks and GSEs complicit in one of the greatest crimes this country has ever experienced.

HUD official criticized Scott Walker's use of foreclosure funds Shortly after Scott Walker and Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen decided to spend part of the state's share of a settlement over foreclosure and mortgage-servicing abuses to plug the state's budget hole - rather than helping homeowners at risk of foreclosure - a top federal official accused the Wisconsin governor of.

Foreclosure filings on the rise Lee County Clerk of Courts Charlie Green has been going over the numbers. He says foreclosure filings are almost double what they were last year. Now he's worried about a case backlog "I think we'll be able to use some dollars that we just got from the state to probably work with the judges to clean up some of it, so it doesn't get backlogged," he said.

Local Governments Consider Eminent Domain To Seize Underwater Mortgages Some leaders from Sacramento to Berkeley, and down to Southern California, are look into a new and highly controversial idea. They want to use eminent domain to seize underwater mortgages from banks, sell them to private investors, refinance at the current market value and substantially slash the amount borrowers owe.

Couple sues bank for wrongful foreclosure In their complaint, the Levines allege Ocwen has sent the couple a notice of its intent to foreclose on their Beaumont property on Aug. 7. However, the Levines say the foreclosure should not occur because Samuel Levine Jr. has offered payment that would bring the couple's loan current. "Defendants have failed and refused to allow him to do so," the suit states.

Georgia banker gets 12-year sentence for fraud As the financial crisis struck, Conner then tried to unload FirstCity nonperforming loans and foreclosed homes to straw buyers, who were taking out loans from Conner to buy the assets. He then tried unsuccessfully to get a $6 million bailout from the Troubled Asset Relief Program.

The Justice Departments MF Global Scandal Dates to 1932 "Those wondering why the Department of Justice has refused to go after Jon Corzine for the vaporization of $1.6 billion in MF Global client funds need look no further than the documents uncovered by the Government Accountability Institute that reveal that the now-defunct MF Global was a client of Attorney General Eric.

Tensions Escalate as DeMarco, Geithner Argue Merits of Principal Reduction In a letter to the Chair and Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs DeMarco rebuffed an offer to use funds from the Toxic Asset Relief Program (TARP) to assist borrowers and said, "After much study, I have concluded the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's adoption of.

Homeowners with underwater mortgages may be stuck for years Its a huge drain on the economy, said Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, a liberal think tank. All these people will be approaching retirement with very little money. Ordinarily, youd expect to have money in your home.

>>>>>>> Mortgage Seizure Via Eminent Domain For Community Stabilization Debate And News Updated Daily http://paper.li/EmDomainDebate/1342319964

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WEEKEND EDITION, AUGUST 20 AUGUST 24, 2012

THURSDAY, AUGUST 23, 2012

ACADEMIA ADVERSARIES ADVOCATES BLOGOSPHERE LEGAL LEGISLATE OP-ED HOMEOWNERS NEWS ForeclosureGate.org Is A Public Service Homeowner Coalition and Cooperative, Created To Exchange News And Information And To Advance Justice For American Homeowners

Real Remedies for the Foreclosure Crisis Exist: The Game-Changing Implications of Bain v. MERS Two landmark developments on August 16 give momentum to the growing interest of cities and counties in addressing the mortgage mess using eminent domain: 1) The Washington State Supreme Court held in Bain v. MERS, et al., that an electronic database called Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems (MERS) is not a "beneficiary" entitled to foreclose under a deed of trust; and 2) San Bernardino County, California, passed a resolution to consider plans to use eminent domain to address the glut of underwater borrowers by purchasing and refinancing their loans.

Profits in G.M.A.C. Financiers, Not U.S.

Bailout

to

Benefit

NYT Front-Pager on Administration Housing Policy Misses Several Key Points What this misses is the documented evidence that this was a conscious strategy on the part of the Administration, and part of their efforts to protect balance sheets. The Treasury bank Secretary admitted this in 2009, when he stated that HAMP, the signature foreclosure mitigation program, was designed to foam the runway for the banks.

Among the companies that were bailed out by the federal government during the financial crisis, perhaps the most intractable is proving to be the company formerly known as the General Motors Acceptance Corporation. Its a case study in how bailouts can linger and profits, when they do come, flow not to the government but to the Warren E. Buffetts of the world.

"Sharpie parties" fuel rampage on foreclosed homes In the age of Facebook and Twitter, a new crime has hit America: "Sharpie parties," gatherings of party revelers armed with "Sharpie" magic markers and lured by social media invitations to wreak havoc on foreclosed homes. Five years into the U.S. foreclosure crisis, Sharpie parties are a new form of blight on the landscape.

Eminent Domain and the Housing Crisis A recent Huffington Post story reported that San Bernardino County in California, where as many as half of all homeowners are underwater on their mortgages, is giving careful consideration to the plan "under which Mortgage Resolution Partners fund would front money to allow local governments to purchase underwater mortgages at market value in exchange for a fixed fee.

Survey: Delinquency Rates Up, Foreclosure Starts Flat in Q2 The delinquency rate for mortgage loans on oneto-four-unit residential properties increased to a seasonally adjusted rate of 7.58 percent as of the end of Q2, an increase from 7.40 in Q1. It is typical for delinquency rates to increase between the first and second quarters of the year.

Petition: Stop Mortgage Fraud and Kickbacks The mortgage fraud law called RESPA (Real Estate Settlement and Procedures Act) has only a 1 year statute of limitations. That means that someone intent on violating this law has very little risk of being held accountable. Lawyers representing consumers in mortgage foreclosure or mortgage fraud situations are reporting that.

Activists use foreclosure

social

media

to

prevent

3 Million Of America's Most Vulnerable Homeowners Are On The Brink Of Foreclosure As many as 3 million American seniors, arguably the most vulnerable consumers in the country, are on the brink of losing their home, according to a recent AARP study. In its report "Nightmare on Main Street," the group looked at the mortgage crisis' effect on the over-50 sect for the first time

Not another. That became the rallying cry as the local activist community with a huge assist from social media mobilized to save one of its own from foreclosure. Rain Burroughs had fallen behind on the payments for her Oregon Hill dwelling.

>>>>>>> Mortgage Seizure Via Eminent Domain For Community Stabilization Debate And News Updated Daily http://paper.li/EmDomainDebate/1342319964

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WEEKEND EDITION, AUGUST 20 AUGUST 24, 2012

FRIDAY, AUGUST 24, 2012

ACADEMIA ADVERSARIES ADVOCATES BLOGOSPHERE LEGAL LEGISLATE OP-ED HOMEOWNERS NEWS ForeclosureGate.org Is A Public Service Homeowner Coalition and Cooperative, Created To Exchange News And Information And To Advance Justice For American Homeowners

Short sales are complicated, but can help homeowners who owe more than property is worth By early July, instead of celebrating their 34th wedding anniversary, Joseph and Mary Damiani were dealing with hyper stress and a headache-producing pile of paperwork. Thats about all they had to show for eight months of struggling to sell their underwater four-bedroom Colonial in Locust Grove, Va. And thats after they agreed on a sales price with a prospective buyer. The good news is that the potential purchaser has been extraordinarily patient.

Bill gives Calif. tenants more foreclosure warning Tenants would get more notice before they can be evicted from homes going through foreclosure under a bill approved by the state Senate. Democratic Sen. Loni Hancock of Berkeley says tenants often are unwitting victims when the house they are renting is foreclosed upon .

HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan discusses housing market, foreclosure crisis (Q&A) Private banks have started cutting mortgage balances for underwater homeowners, but government-sponsored Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have not, despite administration pressure. Their top regulator, Federal Housing Finance Agency head Ed DeMarco says principal.

Foreclosure blamed for West Nile case A Los Angeles woman is blaming a fetid swimming pool at the foreclosed home next door for her case of West Nile virus. Debbie Davis, who lives in the upscale Los Angeles neighborhood of Studio City, says she's spent months trying to get bank representatives and Los Angeles code enforcement and public health officials to clean up the "sludge pit" next door.

Half of mortgage borrowers under 40 are underwater Rising home prices helped nearly one million homeowners emerge from being underwater on their mortgages during the second quarter. But younger homeowners are still struggling to stay afloat, according to report from Zillow.The percentage of borrowers who owed more on their homes than.

Number of homes facing foreclosure rose in July More U.S. homes started on the foreclosure path in July, as lenders tackled a backlog of mortgages gone unpaid even as they pulled back on home repossessions. The number of homes that received an initial notice of default the first step in the foreclosure process increased 6 percent in July compared to the same month last year, foreclosure listing firm.

Metro Detroit foreclosures decline, but expect another increase Experts caution Detroiters not to become too optimistic about an upswing in the housing market, however, because the number of foreclosures will likely be increasing in the next 6 months. Darren Blomquist, a vice president for RealtyTrac, stated that the number of foreclosure notices has increased in the last two months.

Bill McMachen of Michigan Buys Hundreds of Foreclosed Properties, Dirt Cheap For around $4.7 million, you might be able to snag one gleaming, top-of-the-line luxury home in a top market. In Michigan's Macomb County, though, it bought one man 627 homes.Bill McMachen, who owns a yacht dealership in Harrison Township, Mich., bagged that bulging real estate portfolio after accepting an enticing offer by Macomb County's treasurer:

Deval Patrick prevention bill

signs

Mass.

foreclosure

The governor said the legislation creates unparalleled consumer protections and ensures that mortgage borrowers are given every chance to stay in their homes.It requires lenders to assess a borrowers circumstances and determine whether the net value in changing an existing loan is more than the anticipated recovery from foreclosure.

>>>>>>> Mortgage Seizure Via Eminent Domain For Community Stabilization Debate And News Updated Daily http://paper.li/EmDomainDebate/1342319964

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