Posts Tagged ‘Oppenheim Law’

Florida Fair Foreclosure Act? Fair to Whom?

Friday, February 24th, 2012
Gavel on House

Photo by The-Lane-Team

Banks need to get their massive foreclosure backlog off the books. There are over 368,000 cases in Florida. I get that.

Getting these properties into the hands of families who can afford them, that is what I want to see. It’s needed to jump start the economy, and no one wants to see the banks out of the neighborhoods more than me.

But it can’t be allowed to happen on the backs of other homeowners plain and simple. Lenders have tried to thrust these homes back onto the market before, and that’s why they just shelled out $25 billion.

The banks were penalized for being unethical, untrustworthy and fraudsters, and it doesn’t look like they have learned their lesson.

Yet a series of proposed bills now making their way through the Florida House and Senate offer banks unjust control over the foreclosure process, all in the name of getting abandoned homes back on the market.

The Senate version, which would create the “Florida Fair Foreclosure Act”, was passed by a judiciary committee earlier this week by a 5-2 vote. There is a similar bill making their way through the House.

But are they really ‘fair’ to homeowners? Absolutely not.

These bills are being pushed by banking industry shills. They make it easier for lenders to foreclose, and allows them to do so faster.

Have the politicians in Tallahassee learned nothing from the settlement? The $25 billion isn’t even in the mail, yet some are back to their old tricks, turning a blind eye to the plights of their constituents and denying them due process.
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Settlement Or No Settlement; Homeowners You Must Stand Your Ground!

Tuesday, February 21st, 2012

If there was anything positive that came out of the prolonged discussions between the states and the banks on the mortgage servicing settlement, it was that banks were reluctant to go full steam ahead in the foreclosure process while talks were ongoing.

But even before the settlement was announced, we saw signs that pointed to more foreclosures in 2012.

According to RealtyTrac, there were 24,783 foreclosure filings in the state of Florida in January, a 14% percent rise from January 2011, the first year-over-year increase in over a year.

Now that the settlement has been agreed to, the training wheels are off.

It’s petal to the metal folks. One thing that the settlement does for the banks is provide them a blueprint for how to proceed in the foreclosure process without getting their fingers stuck in the cookie jar.

Which means borrowers will once again have to defend themselves just as rigorously as they did pre-robosigning.

I’ve been asked if the settlement changes my advice to homeowners, to which I reply, ABSOLUTELY NOT!

You must continue to stand your ground. If you are in foreclosure or about to enter foreclosure, I will say what I have always said, you must fight the banks and force them to kick you out of your home.

The settlement may have changed the rules for the banks, but it shouldn’t change the rules for you, the homeowner. The banks will not transform into wonderful and charitable companies just because the settlement might penalize them.

Make no mistake about it, they will continue to come at you and come at your hard.
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Where’s Waldo? Where’s a Copy of the Mortgage Settlement?

Thursday, February 16th, 2012

Just like Waldo, a copy of the mortgage settlement is awfully hard to find.

The dust has finally settled on last week’s mortgage settlement.

It dominated the news cycle once the details of the agreement broke. I spent the bulk of my day a week ago talking to the media and weighing in on it’s significance.

But there is one clear question that I haven’t heard anyone been able to definitely answer yet.

Has anyone seen the darn thing, in it’s entirety? I sure haven’t!

I’ve seen press releases from the states, plenty of summaries, and an extensive statement from Attorney General Eric Holder. So there are details that are out there. But the document itself?

Right now Waldo is easier to find.

No formal agreement has been filed with the courts and we hear it may not even be completed!

And according to my friends at the Crew of 42 Blog, Congress hasn’t seen a copy of it either.

Maryland congressman Elijah Cummings is quoted in Crew of 42 as saying he wasn’t concerned that he hadn’t seen a copy and that he trusts his attorney general.

Color us slightly more skeptical.

A website was set up explaining the details of the settlement the day it was announced, but where the actual settlement is supposed to be it just says coming soon.

For a government that prides itself on being transparent, this just can not stand.

President Obama may be reengaged and all signs point to him being back on the side of the homeowner, but there are plenty who remain unconvinced and this doesn’t exactly help.
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Robosigning Settlement Proves Sky Was Falling! Chicken Little Was Right!

Friday, February 10th, 2012

Yesterday’s robosigning settlement that all but one state ultimately signed off on, was far from perfect.

Let’s make that perfectly clear.

Depending on what you have read, you might be outraged, you might be relieved, you might be overjoyed. And the target of your wrath or sympathy might depend on your own personal perspective.

But make no mistake about it, yesterday was a day of reckoning, for me, and much more importantly, for the people I represent.

Yes, the banks got a slap on the wrist and the money they are trickling back to the homeowners won’t make up for the systemic fraud these lenders engaged in, and make no mistake it was fraud at the highest level.

I wish I could personally put the handcuffs on each CEO who allowed robosigning to occur.

But here’s the silver lining, now we have a reengaged President, who is anxious to see the job done. We have Eric Schneiderman on the case, and he is going full-speed right at the banks.

They may have not gotten the flogging they deserve, but I am optimistic that they surely will.

Conservatives can blame the borrowers all they want, and certainly not all were faultless. But the banks were the grown-ups here, they should have known better. They had the chance, in the midst of the housing boom, to stop, take a breath and take a look back at what they had done.

They didn’t.

The truth is no amount of money would have been enough. And since we can’t put the banks in jail, they got what was in essence a very public shaming. And people’s eyes were opened. What you have now learned, can not be unlearned.
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