Wednesday, October 03, 2007

Horses escape and then the barn door closes

Central Valley Business Times:

With California an epicenter of the mortgage meltdown and housing slump, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger says he will sign three bills that he says will increase protections for Californians who own or plan to purchase homes and to expand affordable housing opportunities.
"It is critical that we continue to take steps to protect Californians against unscrupulous lending practices and to ensure that consumers can make informed decisions," says Mr. Schwarzenegger in a written statement released by his office Wednesday morning.

The bills are:
• SB 223 by Sen. Mike Machado, D-Linden, which will make it a crime for licensed appraisers to engage in any appraisal activity that is connected to the purchase, sale, transfer, financing or development of property if their compensation is impacted by the final price generated by the appraisal.

• SB 385, also by Mr. Machado, which permits state agencies involved with residential mortgage lending and brokering to adopt emergency measures and new policies to ensure that all mortgage lenders and brokers are subject to federal guidelines on non-traditional mortgages. This law impacts the Department of Financial Institutions, the Department of Corporations and the Department of Real Estate.

• AB 929, by Assemblywoman Sharon Runner, R-Lancaster, which increases the amount of affordable housing in California by raising the total debt that the California Housing Finance Agency can carry by $2 billion. CalHFA issues bonds to finance housing for low and moderate-income families.

California’s foreclosure rate is more than twice the national average and the Mortgage Bankers Association is reporting that the state's homeowners hold 20 percent of the nation's subprime adjustable rate mortgages, a record number of which are expected to result in foreclosure.

"It's absolutely crucial that Californians facing the threat of foreclosure reach out to their lenders and discuss available options to save their homes," says the governor. "The worst thing someone can do is nothing -- most lenders would prefer not to foreclose, but 50 percent of borrowers who lose their homes never return calls from their lenders."

Mr. Schwarzenegger says he has ordered other actions to help homeowners facing financial distress or foreclosure as a result of non-traditional mortgages.

These include ordering the state’s licensing departments to adopt regulations to strengthen underwriting and consumer disclosures, in order to ensure that consumers have the tools to fully understand the ramifications of taking out a sub-prime loan. As part of this effort, licensees will use a new, multilingual consumer disclosure form to illustrate worst-case payment scenarios.

Mr. Schwarzenegger says the state’s licensing departments will work closely with law enforcement to discipline lenders and brokers who take unfair advantage of consumers. The departments are also currently training consumer counselors, non-profits and legal aid societies to help identify licensees who have defrauded consumers or otherwise violated state law, so enforcement actions can be taken against their licenses.

He says state agencies will continue to partner with local legislators in the areas hit hardest by foreclosures to connect borrowers with non-profit counselors who can help them negotiate with their lenders.

The state has already held events in Stockton, Riverside, Sun Valley and La Quinta.

The state has also set up a hotline for homeowners in mortgage trouble. The "HOPE Hotline" (888) 995-HOPE or online at www.995HOPE.org provides free mortgage counseling 24 hours a day, seven days a week

19 comments:

Appraisal Police said...

• SB 223 by Sen. Mike Machado, D-Linden, which will make it a crime for licensed appraisers to engage in any appraisal activity that is connected to the purchase, sale, transfer, financing or development of property if their compensation is impacted by the final price generated by the appraisal.

It already is and always has been illegal for appraisers to do this. Those of you who have access to an appraisal report please turn to pace 5, cert 23 and read it out loud. I sign every report under penalty of perjury that I didn't do what SB 223 says I can't do.

Please wake me up when our state legislators get serious about mortgage fraud.

Curious said...

I must have missed the hotline number to call to report fraudulent buyers, can you please repost it?

Thank you.

/snark.

Mike said...

Appraisal Police said...
• SB 223 by Sen. Mike Machado, D-Linden, which will make it a crime for licensed appraisers to engage in any appraisal activity that is connected to the purchase, sale, transfer, financing or development of property if their compensation is impacted by the final price generated by the appraisal.

It already is and always has been illegal for appraisers to do this. Those of you who have access to an appraisal report please turn to pace 5, cert 23 and read it out loud. I sign every report under penalty of perjury that I didn't do what SB 223 says I can't do.

Please wake me up when our state legislators get serious about mortgage fraud.

~~~

Mike Machado's next bill is to make murder illegal. ;)

dicktracy said...

IN COUNTRYWIDE WE TRUST

New PR campaign?

http://people.bakersfield.com/home/Blog/refiguy/15483

This is a company that holds the largest portfolio of pay option ARM's (consumers called this loan pick a payment). CW stated they would be responsible by ONLY allowing the consumer to go 125% negative. Remember this is based on appraised value (Newton, Newton) at time of sale. Reality is most consumer's are now 200% upside down! There is no mention of SUPERMAN in CW press release.

http://money.cnn.com/2007/10/03/news/companies/countrywide_pr/index.htm

The Editor said...

I think all participants and spectators forget that real estate is a live active market. For our client's looking to buy they cheer every price reduction for the sellers they weep at the "lost" money. "Equity" is magic money to me until you convert it to cash through a sale or refinance. I posted a piece on the jumbo market you might want to read it.
Cheers.
http://thegreatloan.blogspot.com

Lou Minatti said...

"AB 929, by Assemblywoman Sharon Runner, R-Lancaster, which increases the amount of affordable housing in California by raising the total debt that the California Housing Finance Agency can carry by $2 billion."

That's enough to bailout perhaps 5,000 homemoaners. How many potential FB's in California? A half a million at this point? 5,000 is farting into the wind. What's the point?

Well, I know the point. Sharon Runner is like all politicians everywhere. Spending your tax money so she can run this ad during the next election cycle:

Sharon Runner led the fight to protect hard-working California home owners by sponsoring the...

Lou Minatti said...

We're all hearing about 1099 relief. The way I read it, dickheads who refi'd for toys and fun can walk away and keep the loot. I don't know how it can be done, but if they get 1099 relief they should be forced to hand over the toys. Plasma TVs, Escalades with the sweet rimz, everything that can be traced back to the refi.

I realize this would add up to a fraction of the loot they stole, but the dickheads shouldn't profit at all.

scotty said...

Lou
You are right on my friend. I could not believe the people at Florez's meeting who thought he was going to wave the magic wand and bail them out. I wanted to stand up and shout "You couldn't afford the house when you bought it, you lied on the application and you used the house as an atm to buy toys so go away"
The sooner these kids realize we don't want to bail out stupidity the better.

Mike said...

SOOOOOOOOOOOOO...

Who else is attending the auctioning off of Dave Crisp's home this coming Wednesday, October 17? I'm looking forward to it, wish I had enough money to buy it myself!

fraudyouwant said...

The end is near. Our busboy has been foreclosed on:

http://www.turnto23.com/news/14293805/detail.html

Is bling the thing or is it fraud?

Funny Circus Bears said...

Check out this list of deliquent taxpayers:

http://tinyurl.com/34nf8s

Scroll down a bit and see Gilbert and Rhonda Crisp of Visalia owe $1.5M. Any relation to young Davey?

They owe more than O.J.!

There is also a Robin and Debra Crisp who also owed quite a sum but were removed from the list - scroll down further to see them.

Professor Shays said...

Can any of you report on the foreclosure scheduled for David Crisp's home today (see earlier posting)?

Bakersfield Bubble said...

Sale was cancelled -

http://www.bakersfield.com/hourly_news/story/262172

Anonymous said...

damn we need more dirt... where is the SOB hiding now?

Bakersfield Bubble said...

LMAO!!!

I heard he moved his offices to some warehouse. Not sure where he moved his residence though...

xmn45 said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
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