By Dave Krieger
It never ceases to amaze me exactly what a company will do to make a lender look noteworthy. And by that I mean exactly what I say when I refer to the Florida Attorney General’s investigation into Lender Processing Service (LPS) aka DOCX’s apparent “manufacturing” of documents use to “prove” that a lender actually owns the note (the unsigned lottery ticket).
A lot of attorneys are waking up to the fact (as the author has known for quite some time) that when you see these documents, they aren’t always real as they seem.
I put together a list of 40 items with Section 7 of my book “Clouded Titles” on what to look for in these apparently-fraudulent documents. To let you know that several of the major law firms in Florida that are being taken to task for using LPS, they had to pay a price for this stuff. Here’s just a sample that was pulled off of their “price list”:
Can you imagine “creating” a missing assignment that would virtually prove the lender that’s foreclosing on you “really owns the note”? And they’re spending $35.00 and some change to virtually steal your home whether they really own it or not. There are title companies that will charge you a fee to do what is known as “corrective action” on a chain of title, wherein a missing quit claim deed or release of lien might be called for; however, something this barbaric?
As I point out in the book, “Clouded Titles”, every single document produced is under scrutiny. That’s what I look for when I work with attorneys on these very exacting challenges. It’s all about the 5 W’s (who, what, when, where and why). When you find someone wearing two hats, the judge needs to know, because someone is going to have to crank out an affidavit. Don’t be fooled by affidavits either, because they’re supposed to reflect personal, first-hand knowledge of the actual drafting and execution of the documents.
This reflects back on the Robo-Mills … where just last week, the author uncovered a purported Wells Fargo robo-mill in Eagan, Minnesota, wherein the robo-signors were alternating notarial signatures with each other. These documents were filed in the Maricopa County Recorder’s office; commingled with a host of other assignments by alleged “Vice Presidents of Loan Documentation” for Ashton Woods Mortgage LLC (a table-funding lender owned by Wells Fargo Bank). This frankly will not stop until a bunch of these folks get put in prison orange and a case in East Texas is coming close to doing just that!