White Collar Crimes Invade the Foreclosure Market

The housing crisis in the United States is providing a ready victim market for foreclosure scammers and criminals who prey on unsuspecting Americans in dire straits. The unprecedented number of foreclosures in this nation is making promising white-collar scammers salivate. New foreclosure assistance companies and loan modification companies are emerging faster than you can count. Former mortgage brokers have now turned around and have suddenly become experts in loan modifications and foreclosure assistance. Everyone seems to be an expert in the foreclosure assistance market. Who will be the next victim? It could be you. Foreclosure scammers commit various serious crimes by perpetrating their crimes, including mail fraud, wire fraud, bank fraud, and providing false statements to federally insured lenders. Americans with a foreclosure problem receive five to ten phone calls every day, and the emails are too numerous to count. However, this is only half the problem. Bankers, scammers, and fake buyers are complicit in these crimes, but government law enforcement officials and even the FDIC are stepping back to allow it to happen. Case in point …

Waver Brickhouse, 69, fell behind on his $ 213,000 home mortgage and needed help. She had always been a churchgoer, but kept mostly to herself, living a lonely life and raising her four adopted children. In 1996, he bought his first home, and as economic times got tough, he fell behind on his mortgage payments in 2005. A white knight suddenly appeared, on the recommendation of a close friend, the white knight who was Home Savers Consulting. . The directors of Home Savers Consulting were not bankers, mortgage brokers, or real estate agents, but they were experts in foreclosure assistance, they said. Both Home Savers directors, Garth Celestine and Phillip Simon, had filed numerous complaints with New York City prosecutors, but no criminal charges were ever filed. Officials with the South Brooklyn Legal Services Foreclosure Prevention Project estimate that Mr. Celestine and Mr. Simon’s company had extracted more than $ 5 million in equity from the homes of unsuspecting individuals in just a handful of cases. How could this happen? How come people fall victim to these unscrupulous scammers? Here’s the tone …

Home Savers Consulting and its directors, Mr. Celestine and Mr. Simon, offered to refinance Ms. Brickhouse’s $ 213,000 home mortgage and make all payments for one year. This would allow Ms. Brickhouse the opportunity to use the money she normally used to pay off the mortgage to pay off her other debts. At the end of the year, Ms. Brickhouse was required to resume paying her mortgage payments and pay a small fee to Home Savers Consulting. Home Savers Consulting said they had found a “sponsor” who would assist Ms. Brickhouse in this transaction. Everything sounds good so far, doesn’t it? Well, keep reading.

In May 2007, Ms. Brickhouse attended a meeting for what she assumed was closing to refinance her home. He met with a representative from Home Savers Consulting, Indy Mac Bank, Yolanda Millett (the sponsor or fake buyer), and Ms. Millett’s attorney. The meeting was not a refinance at all. Without Ms. Brickhouse, everyone was there to sell her house and strip her of all her equity.

Ms. Millet, for her complicity as a fake buyer, received $ 8,000. Indy Mac Bank immediately awarded the new owner, Ms. Millet, a $ 380,000 mortgage that allowed Home Savers to withdraw $ 150,000 in home equity, the small fee that Home Savers Consulting would receive. After the year ended, Ms. Millet returned the deed to Ms. Brickhouse along with the $ 380,000 mortgage. Now, instead of a $ 213,000 mortgage, Ms. Brickhouse faces a $ 380,000 mortgage! But the situation worsens.

Around the same time, Indy Mac Bank collapsed. The FDIC took over Indy Mac Bank and its large distressed mortgage portfolio, including the $ 380,000 mortgage on Ms. Brick House. FDIC representatives notified Ms. Brickhouse that she owed the $ 380,000 mortgage and wanted payment. Ms. Brickhouse, now realizing the fraud that was committed, refused and said he owed the $ 213,000 but not the $ 380,000 that was due to a fraudulent transaction.

Federal officials, in what I think is an astonishing statement, said they have no way of determining whether Home Savers Consulting committed fraud, and furthermore, they claimed that Indy Mac Bank was not involved! Not involved, you mean it! Court documents show that a representative from Indy Mac Bank was at the meeting, provided the $ 380,000 mortgage, and knew that Home Savers had no legal status and still did nothing. Equally incredible is the statement from federal officials who say they do not know if fraud was committed. Do these people really have a responsible job in our government? Apparently they do, but they certainly shouldn’t.

Ms. The Brickhouse case is still in limbo. Fortunately, he obtained legal assistance and all parties are trying to reach a reasonable and fair solution. Home Savers Consulting is still in business and federal prosecutors have yet to file criminal charges. Ms. Millett, for her part in the scam, stepped forward and admitted in an affidavit that Ms. Brickhouse “did not at any time believe that ownership of the property in question passed to me and that her intention it was never relinquishing ownership. “

The doors are wide open for get-rich-quick scammers in this hugely growing foreclosure market. Currently, federal officials are doing little to try to reduce this epidemic of loan modification companies that slip away overnight. However, the stupidity and absurdity of the FDIC officials, as demonstrated in the Brickhouse case, parallels the cruel and ruthless behavior of those who perpetrated the crime.

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