Congress’ dumbest bill for the next housing crisis: H.R. 5148— “ACCESS TO AFFORDABLE MORTGAGES” ACT
Reply
Finally, Wall Street gets put on trial: We can still hold the 0.1 percent responsible for tanking the economy
Oh, it wouldn’t be so hard to convince a jury…once you inform the jury that the investors were primarily pension funds that had pertinent criteria for investing: (1) the investments must be liquid, and (2) the bond investments must be rated Triple A. In order to be liquid, defaults and refinances must occur so underwriting guidelines were significantly relaxed (FUND ‘EM) on purpose to fill the trusts with loans that would likely default and insurance would payoff. When loans did not default quick enough, more credit and refinances were offered (dangled) with refined sales pitches encouraging the homeowner to take on more debt for a short period of time in order to get a better interest rate and 30 year fixed loan. These sales pitches were so perfected and convincing that homeowners didn’t even question or maybe they would have found out that they were actually participating in a Wall Street securities scheme.
The bonds were erroneously rated Triple A when there was no way they were anywhere near Triple A – that issue has been well documented by numerous lawsuits against the rating companies. It appears no one took the time to see if the actual loan documents had been timely assigned to the trusts, either because they were in on it and knew that they had not been assigned – or the regulators, insurance and rating companies were negligent idiots.
Show the jury the patents created by Fannie and the banks, explain the scheme and bring in several dozen homeowners from around the country and when they all start telling the same story – the pieces of the puzzle fit like a glove. It shouldn’t be very hard to convince a jury – just take a look at the multi-million dollar awards homeowners have been given once they do finally make it to a jury trial.
The Tea Party regards Barack Obama as a kind of devil figure, but when it comes to hunting down the fraudsters responsible for the economic disaster of the last six years, his administration has stuck pretty close to the Tea Party script. The initial conservative reaction to the disaster, you will recall, was to blame the crisis on the people at the bottom,
on minorities and proletarians lost in an orgy of financial misbehavior. Sure enough, when taking on ordinary people who got loans during the real-estate bubble, the president’s Department of Justice has shown admirable devotion to duty, filing hundreds of mortgage-fraud cases against small-timers.
But high-ranking financiers? Obama’s Department of Justice has thus far shown virtually no interest in holding leading bankers criminally accountable for what went on in the last decade. That is ruled out not only by the Too Big to Jail doctrine that top-ranking…
View original post 203 more words
Banks unsure if mortgage bonds count as liquidity coverage
The banks wrote more loans than they can legally hold. Watch for more legislation in their favor and lobbing on this subject.
New banking regulations require large financial institutions to hold enough “easy-to-sell assets,” in order to survive an economic crisis.
Now, the big banks are uncertain whether or not their $1.1 trillion of aggregated mortgage debt qualifies as this type of asset, according to an article in Bloomberg.
The headline of the article states, that as a result, the new banking regulations leave the largest financial institutions “guessing” about what counts as liquidity and what does not:
Left unclear was whether some or all of a type of bonds known as agency collateralized mortgage obligations can count toward the liquidity coverage ratio approved this week by U.S. banking regulators.
The government-backed debt, which isn’t explicitly mentioned in the rule, represents a big part of bank holdings. Wall Street banks create the investments by bundling existing bonds into notes with varying risks, meaning they help support the broader mortgage-backed securities market that funds and…
View original post 11 more words
Meet The “Access To Affordable Mortgages” Bill: How Congress Will Create The Next Crisis
Oh, man. Many in Congress are certainly in bed with financial institutions where, once again, they will create another financial crisis. Can’t blame the banksters first, Congress, since Congress is trying to pass another bill which I bet, the bank lobbyists wrote.
Submitted by Simon Black via Sovereign Man blog,
Say hello to the next financial crisis, brought to you courtesy of the dumbest new bill of the week: H.R. 5148: Access to Affordable Mortgages Act.
Ordinarily whenever an individual wants to borrow money for a mortgage, the bank conducts due diligence… both on the borrower as well as the property.
It’s in the banks’ interest (as well as the banks’ depositors) to ensure that the property is at least worth as much as the amount being borrowed. Duh.
Congress doesn’t agree. Apparently when banks conduct property appraisals, that seems to unfairly discriminate against some segment of the population…
View original post 399 more words
Banks fight Springfield foreclosure ordinances in Supreme Judicial Court
Where’s that poster that states should make laws not banks.
BOSTON – A group of Western Massachusetts banks argued before the state’s highest court on Thursday that the city of Springfield’s anti-foreclosure ordinances should be overturned.
The banks say the local ordinances contradict state laws, and a bond levied on lenders constitutes an illegal tax. “It’s not that banks are opposed to mortgage laws and reform, but to how it’s being done,” said Craig Kaylor, general counsel for Hampden Bank, one of the banks that brought the lawsuit. “These are for the state to decide, not city by city.”
But the city disagrees and says the laws are necessary to avoid blight and protect neighborhoods that have high rates of foreclosure.
The Next Housing Crisis: Aging Americans’ Homes
There’s another potential housing crisis coming and this one won’t be a collapse in home values.
The nation is facing a lack of affordable, physically-accessible and well-located homes for America’s aging population — especially those with low incomes, according to a new, gloomy study released today by the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies & AARP Foundation.
“You’ve got a scenario with the largest generation we’ve ever had moving into their senior years combined with the fact that longevity is increasing,” says Jonathan Smoke, chief economist at Realtor.com, the site of the National Association of Realtors. “And we’re fairly ill prepared to address the housing needs and challenges of them.”
Please Help and Support The Torrenga Family Fighting Foreclosure
Fighting a non-traditional mortgage loan foreclosure (NTM) is one of the hardest and heart-wrenching actions anyone can undertake. What is even more frustrating is the inability to find a good foreclosure attorney when you need him/her.This was the case for KathyJo Torrenga, who started her family in this home. Click HERE to support the Torrenga Family.
The Torrenga’s live in rural Muskegon, MI and let’s face it, even in big cities it’s hard to find knowledgeable foreclosure defense attorneys. Good defense attorneys are few and far between and bank fraud – as we see in these huge settlements – runs rampant. KathyJo tried to defend her home pro se after searching for an attorney that could understand a complicated securitization case. Continue reading
Bank of America Requests Judge Leniency in $1.3B Mortgage Case
Hopefully, Judge Rakoff upholds the jury verdict.
Bank of America is asking for leniency from a federal judge regarding the jury verdict in a separate mortgage fraud ruling. The district judge had ordered the big bank to pay $1.3 billion after a jury found its Countrywide unit guilty of fraudulent mortgage loans to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
Read more:Click here.
99 HOMES: SPIDERMAN ACTOR STARS IN FORECLOSURE DRAMA RESEARCHED IN PALM BEACH COUNTY
Wow! This ought to be a thriller… And surely a sequel.
Andrew Garfield, who stars in the Amazing Spiderman, is leaving his web-slinging behind to play a bluecollar everyman who gets caught up in the 2008 foreclosure crisis.
The new film, 99 Homes, was co-written and directed by Ramin Bahrani, who spent time learning about the housing meltdown and its impacts on consumers with Palm Beach Gardens foreclosure fighter Lynn Szymoniak.
The movie, set in Orlando, premiered last weekend at the Telluride Film Festival. Bahrani toured foreclosed homes in Lake Worth and Belle Glade, and sat in on Palm Beach County foreclosure hearings under three different judges.
In a Monday story from Deadline Hollywood, Bahrani describes watching as homeowners faced Palm Beach County foreclosure judges during “rocket docket” hearings.
“After a while, the people started winning, and I turned to Lynn and asked, ‘What is going on?’ and she said, ‘The judge is seeing you with…
View original post 42 more words
Countrywide’s CEO Mozilo speaks: “We didn’t do anything wrong”
Nahhh…Countrywide didn’t have their own appaisers come into markets and inflate appraisals. Underwriters just assumed 1960 block homes were worth $600,000. Just “FUND ‘EM”!
Now that is the joke of the day…
Six years after the financial crisis and the government is still seeking justice for the financial pain and meltdown of America’s economy.
But according to an article in Bloomberg, the Countrywide CEO Angelo Mozilo, seen as one of the main culprits behind the subprime crisis and speaking in a rare interview, is baffled by a new effort to punish him.
Remorse for heading a company that made so many bad loans? Not a chance.
Instead, Mozilo said he is proud of his past triumphs and it his critics who are misguided:
“You’ll have to ask those people, ‘What do you have against Mozilo, what did he do?’” Countrywide Financial co-founder Angelo Mozilo said. “Countrywide didn’t change. I didn’t change. The world changed.”
“No, no, no, we didn’t do anything wrong,” he said, adding that a real estate collapse was…
View original post 108 more words
Deadly Clear 