Travel/Leisure: foreclosure victims

Only the banksters could get away with this:

TRUCKEE, Calif. — When Mimi Ash arrived at her mountain chalet here for a weekend ski trip, she discovered that someone had broken into the home and changed the locks....

The culprit, Ms. Ash soon learned, was not a burglar but her bank. According to a federal lawsuit filed in October by Ms. Ash, Bank of America had wrongfully foreclosed on her house and thrown out her belongings, without alerting Ms. Ash beforehand.

Ash was in the process of loan modification with Bank of America at the time. And they didn't just break in, they completely emptied the home, even taking "a wooden box, its top inscribed with the words 'Together Forever,' that contained the ashes of her late husband, Robert."

In Florida, contractors working for Chase Bank used a screwdriver to enter Debra Fischer’s house in Punta Gorda and helped themselves to a laptop, an iPod, a cordless drill, six bottles of wine and a frosty beer, left half-empty on the counter, according to assertions in a lawsuit filed in August. Ms. Fisher was facing foreclosure, but Chase had not yet obtained a court order, her lawyer says.

The break-in was discovered when a Canadian couple renting the house returned from the beach.

Turns out these and countless other Americans have become victims again. They're victims of the deficit peacocks.

WASHINGTON -- Despite mounting evidence of big banks committing serious fraud in the foreclosure process, the U.S. Senate eliminated $35 million in legal aid to homeowners trying to keep their homes.

The fund was wiped out in order to meet government spending caps advocated by Sens. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) and Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), but will likely end up costing taxpayers much more in the long run, as wrongful foreclosures burn through the balance sheets of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The slashing of the foreclosure-assistance fund is just one casualty of Washington's increasing bipartisan push to cut spending across the board....

Recent reports suggest severe, nationwide problems with the mortgage system. A survey of 96 attorneys found that banks started foreclosure proceedings on 2,500 borrowers who were negotiating a loan modification. The survey was conducted by the National Association of Consumer Advocates and the National Consumer Law Center.

There's no relief in sight from the administration, either. Treasury has refused to use any of the funds for the Wall Street bailout for homeowner legal aid. Much worse, the Federal Reserve is actually blocking new foreclosure regulations that would homeowners.

WASHINGTON -- Top policymakers at the Federal Reserve are fighting efforts to rein in widely reported bank abuses, sparking an inter-agency feud with the FDIC and the Treasury Department. The Fed, along with the more bank-friendly Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, is resisting moves to craft rules cracking down on banks that charge illegal fees and carry out improper foreclosures. The FDIC supports such rules, according to an FDIC official involved in the dispute.

The new regulations would rein in debt collection, loan modification and foreclosure proceedings at bank divisions called "mortgage servicers." Servicers have committed widespread fraud in the foreclosure process. While the recent robo-signing of fraudulent documents has received the most attention, consumer advocates have complained about improper fees and servicer mistakes that lead to foreclosure for years.

It's the banksters' world, and we're apparently to be considered lucky if we get to live in one of their houses, which is what they and the government consider them. It's hard to arrive at any other conclusion than dday does when it comes to the Fed, "They don’t want to stop the banks from breaking into your house." And your representatives in the Senate are fine with that.

Also, lastly, I hear today from the lawyers at JALA, the Jacksonville Legal Aid office whose excellent work I profiled in the piece, that their offices are going to be losing three attorneys in January due to a budgetary shortfall. This organization needs donations to survive (as do legal aid offices all around the country), and here’s why this matters; most of the people who are being foreclosed upon actually have ways to fight back if they can get legal representation. The problem is that offices like JALA have a finite number of attorneys, and so are forced to turn back people who come knocking asking for legal help. Each additional attorney, then, can keep dozens of people in their homes. I strongly suggest that anyone who has extra funds give if they can to local legal aid offices in their states, or even JALA in particular (their donation info can be found at www.jaxlegalaid.org), because this right now is crunch time and a little money can go a long way to helping stop the foreclosure bleeding. I myself am making a donation today.

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Wednesday, December 22, 2010

foreclosure victims

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