November 2010

One other funny note: local reporters in Jacksonville went around and interviewed some of the principals in “Invasion of the Home Snatchers,” including among others Judge A.C. Soud, the justice who presided over the “rocket docket” and threatened local attorney [...]

Image by Getty Images via @daylife One month ago, the city of Chicago and the surrounding suburbs of Cook County became a foreclosure-free zone. It wasn’t the banks or judges that instituted the moratorium, because they were still moving cases [...]

Image by Getty Images via @daylife Former Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray advised banks that engaged in fraud on the courts (by submitting falsified affidavits) to negotiate meaningful loan modifications. Jamie Dimon‘s Evasion Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase, said [...]

Should we be surprised that the Rolling Stone writer who called Goldman Sachs the “great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity” would find judges rubber-stamping foreclosures no less evil?

After Cheryl’s mother, Betty, passed away, she took control of the Brea house. But then the economy cut into her finances and Cheryl had trouble making the mortgage payments. Her lender, Wells Fargo, then sent her a notice of default, [...]

The state is asking a court to stop another company from promising worried homeowners it can halt their mortgage foreclosures. It’s also seeking to force the company to pay back $950 fees to its customers. Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli alleges [...]

In hopes of keep the bank from taking their home, Groves residents Keith and Julia Keen have filed suit against Sun Trust Mortgage. The suit was filed Nov. 3 in Jefferson County District Court. Court records show that the Keens [...]

A major Detroit-based bankruptcy lawyer warns anyone considering defaulting on their homes not to fall victim to several mortgage modification schemes that get homeowners into more serious financial calamity. “People are desperate when they apply for these mortgage modifications,” Attorney [...]

Fewer Colorado homeowners are entering foreclosure, but more of them are losing their homes once they get behind, according to the Colorado Division of Housing’s third-quarter foreclosure report. Foreclosure sales through Sept. 30 were 19,202, on track to surpass the [...]

“For the past two years, 20 percent of the modifications failed within the first six months,” said Bill Sanchez, the vice president of Tampa Bay Community Development Corporation, a HUD-approved housing counseling agency. Sanchez says the new program aims to [...]

ANDOVER, Mass. — Andover police are continuing to investigate the death of a homeowner on Sandy Brook Circle Thursday after neighbors reported a fire at the house and the man was found dead inside. A warning note was found posted [...]

The state of Ohio continues to hold its place in the top 10 in the nation for number of foreclosures. According to data collected by the real estate company Realty Trac, foreclosure filings were mailed to slightly more than 13,000 [...]

This week the District Council approved a measure requiring lenders to go through six months of mediation with a homeowner before proceeding with a foreclosure. Mediation allows the borrower and the lender’s representative to negotiate, with the guidance of an [...]

Image by TheTruthAbout via Flickr A federal judge in Los Angeles lambasted federal prosecutors late Wednesday at the sentencing of Bruce Karatz, the former chief executive of KB Home, who was given five years’ probation following his conviction on charges [...]

The mortgage servicing biz is not coming out of the foreclosure scandal unscathed. What was once a fairly steady industry — based on narrow margins but lots of volume — is suddenly having to rethink its business model. The foreclosure [...]

The American Banker published a story laying out apparent abuses in the business of so-called force-placed insurance – the practice in which creditors such as mortgage servicers buy an insurance policy to replace a homeowner’s lapsed one. That’s fine as far [...]

His experience is one of the biggest frustrations for struggling homeowners – getting hit with a foreclosure proceeding at the same time a loan modification is being worked out with a bank.

Programs designed to keep owners in their homes are being upended by lost paperwork and procedural errors ill Gray of Mesquite, Tex., says her 3-year-old son, Anthony, often tells her before he goes to bed: “I wanna go to the [...]