“We are fighting in the defense of our homes, our families, and posterity. We have petitioned, and our petitions have been scorned. We have entreated, and our entreaties have been disregarded. We have begged, and they have mocked when our calamity came.
We beg no longer; we entreat no more; we petition no more. We defy them!” William Jennings Bryan (1896). Some things never change – or will they?
Principal reductions are likely taxable too. Settlements in a lawsuit appear to be taxable. Wow… This needs examination and some expert tax advisors.
On February 28, 2013, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) and the Federal Reserve Board released amendments to their enforcement actions against 13 mortgage servicers for deficient practices in mortgage loan servicing and foreclosure processing.1 The amendments require the servicers to provide cash payments to borrowers whose homes were in any stage of the foreclosure process in 2009 or 2010 and whose mortgages were serviced by one of the 13 servicers or their affiliates.2 Regulators have published the payment amounts on their websites.3
All payments received in connection with the IFR Payment Agreement may be subject to taxation depending on the borrower’s individual circumstances. This webpage provides general information regarding potential U.S. federal income tax consequences of these payments if you are a citizen or resident of the United States.4
The Independent Foreclosure Review Payment Qualified Settlement Fund (QSF) is required to comply with IRS information reporting requirements with respect to…
View original post 990 more words
“The Fed messed with the wrong senator…” posted David Dayen on Salon. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) grilled federal officials about illegal bank foreclosures at a Senate Banking Committee hearing on Thursday. She wanted to know if they would give information to victims of illegal foreclosures–or if they just want to protect the banks. Warren asked, “You now know individual cases where the banks violated the law, and you’re not going to tell the homeowners, or at least it’s not clear yet whether you’re going to do that?” Continue reading
You’ll notice that the banks and servicers normally will not correspond to homeowners using email. The banks prefer homeowners fax their information and the banks use the telephone letting you know they are recording their calls.
It’s time to turn the tables. Take good notes and keep a complete file of all your conversations and correspondence with the banks and servicers – but you may also want and need to record the telephone conversations you have with the banks. Here are some tips from a private investigator on the legality of recording telephone conversations. Click here for the latest telephone recording devices. Continue reading
Too Big for It’s Britches! Probably better to find another provider anyway, like a safe in your mattress, before the next Cyprus tsunami comes along.
Some 18,000 clients of Deutsche Bank Nederland will receive a letter over the next few days telling them to take their business elsewhere, the Financieele Dagblad reports on Thursday.
The FD says clients will be told ‘Deutsche Bank is not a suitable bank for you’. Some 2,000 private customers will be given until November to find a new financial service provider. The rest of the unwanted client list is made up of small firms, foundations and sports clubs, the paper says.
The list consists of clients who moved to Deutsche Bank when it took over parts of ABN Amro three years ago. Deutsche Bank bought a number of activities which ABN Amro was ordered by Brussels to sell when it merged with Fortis Nederland.
– See more at: http://www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2013/04/deutsche_bank_to_tell_18000_du.php#sthash.GxKylZGv.dpuf
How many people have to lose their savings, their equity and their pensions before there is a revolution – or is the intellectual revolution already here – “refuge to reconstruction”? That is the $54 Billion dollar question.
Posted by Larry Doyle, Sense on Cents
One man’s wealth tax becomes another man’s wealth confiscation
I have no doubt that given the need for sources of revenue by Uncle Sam and other sovereign governments, the topic of “the protection of property rights” will be increasingly brought front and center in the public arena.
We saw this play out in Cyprus just a few weeks back, and we witness another example of this topic just the other day in a WSJ article, Now He’s After Your 401(K). Continue reading
“But your Honor, they really did all that to me!”
DO NOT PLEAD A LAUNDRY LIST. The vast majority of these affirmative defenses will not apply to any given case–they are intended as a brainstorming tool, and certainly should not be included in full. Rule 11 requires that you have a good faith basis for believing an affirmative defense actually applies before pleading it, and in discovery you will likely need to respond to an interrogatory identifying all factual bases for every affirmative defense you plead.
–
List of Affirmative Defenses (Partial):
– failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted (almost always use)
– statutory defenses prerequisites (these will vary depending on the claims)
– preemption by federal or other law
– accord and satisfaction
– arbitration and award
– assumption of risk
– economic loss rule
– contributory or comparative negligence
– intervening cause
– supervening cause
– claimants own conduct, or by the conduct…
View original post 869 more words
Don’t you just love it?! Maybe some of those offshore accounts can be applied as a tax deduction before their owners get caught and go to prison for tax evasion…yeah, sure.
Here’s a tip for all you tax payers out there: Donating money to help reduce the federal debt counts as one of the more unusual charitable tax deductions.
View original post 431 more words
Dual tracking is when a servicer has you filling out modification paperwork and sending them your bank statements, proof of residency, tax returns, P&Ls, payroll stubs, etc. (over and over) and actually is processing your foreclosure at the same time. Homeowners were supposed to be protected from dual tracking during modification.
But in case you were wondering if you can sleep at night while under the modification game – here are some interesting facts just released from the California Reinvestment Coalition (CRC) who distributed a survey to housing counselors in February 2013 to Report on how the banks were holding up their end of the bargain. So, if California is any indication of what the banks are doing around the rest of the country – be very wary. Continue reading
MOVIE INSIDER: A security guard for an armored truck, Jim (Dominic Purcell) is a blue-collar New Yorker who works hard to earn a living. His wages support himself and his wife Rosie (Erin Karpluk), who is on the upswing recovering from a near-fatal illness. Yet things start to fall apart after Rosie’s health insurance stops covering her treatment and Jim’s life savings are lost via a disastrous investment his stockbroker had advised him to make. As a row of professional and personal dominoes falls, Jim is confronted by the realization that, after being abused and exploited by financial institutions for far too long, he has only one choice: to strike back. Sounds all too familiar?
Here are the movie trailers that are more than compelling drama. Assault on Wall Street is a stirring and probably a recurring dream for many foreclosed homeowners and pension-less employees that have been stripped of their savings, equity, homes and security. Continue reading
Deadly Clear 