Posted on 11/12/2006 4:52:44 PM PST by Sybeck1
Illegal immigrants meet little resistance getting home loans
Marleny Carranza's cell phone plays salsa music when a call comes in, and these days it rings often.
She and her sister Sandra Carranza are doing a brisk business selling homes to Hispanic immigrants, and they don't turn away people who may be in the country illegally.
The Carranza sisters work with Su Casa Realty, a Century 21 franchise with an office in Hickory Hill. They are among many real estate professionals and bankers nationwide willing to sell houses to illegal immigrants.
Giving home loans to illegal immigrants is a relatively safe bet because they usually earn steady incomes and because the federal government isn't trying hard to make them leave, some businesses executives say.
In fact, one group that criticizes the practice says the federal government makes it easy for illegal immigrants to establish a permanent home here.
Meanwhile, federal regulators permit the sale of homes to people here illegally and encourage banks to reach out to all immigrants.
Immigration enforcement has traditionally been light in non-border areas, and some business leaders believe illegal immigrants' integration in the national economy means the government won't drive them out.
"I don't think it's physically possible or fiscally possible to deport 12 million folks," said Bob Byrd, chairman and CEO of the Bank of Bartlett.
About 18 months ago, the community bank started a mortgage program for people without Social Security numbers.
While some people without Social Security numbers are here legally, many who don't have the numbers are illegal immigrants.
"We're doing this because we think it's right," Byrd said. "We're doing this because it's legal. And we're doing this because it's profitable."
Illegal immigrants represent a growing market: There are an estimated 12 million in the nation and between 100,000 and 150,000 in Tennessee, according to the Pew Hispanic Center, a nonpartisan research group.
Home sales to undocumented immigrants could be worth $60 billion, said Mary Mancera a spokeswoman for the National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals.
The Carranza sisters are tapping that pool. Originally from Honduras, a poor country in Central America, they landed in Memphis after doctors referred their teenage sister to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital for cancer treatment. Their sister, Fanny Carranza, died in 1998.
Today, Marleny Carranza, 37, who studied law in Honduras, is part owner of Su Casa Realty.
The franchise opened in 2002 and anticipates selling its 1,500th house sometime next year, she said. It has 22 agents, most of them Spanish-speaking, and has sold homes throughout the area.
The sisters say about half their potential clients lack Social Security numbers. But they tell clients that they could sell the property if they're deported, and many clients have family members with legal status who could help pay loans if they were gone.
Many clients have substantial savings from blue collar jobs or small businesses. Some immigrants without Social Security numbers have paid as much as $100,000 up front, the sisters said.
"They save money, and that is power," said Sandra Carranza, who said she left the field she's trained in, electrical engineering, because selling houses to immigrants is more lucrative.
The sisters sometimes work with Bank of Bartlett, which accepts identification cards issued by foreign governments. The bank helps immigrants who lack Social Security cards obtain an individual tax identification number through the Internal Revenue Service, which doesn't share the information with immigration enforcement officers. The bank uses tax returns and other payment records to allow immigrants without a credit history to show their ability to pay the mortgage, Byrd said.
Byrd wouldn't say how many home loans the bank has given, but he said the total value is between $12 million and $14 million.
A private firm that Byrd wouldn't name backs the loans -- federally backed firms Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae don't support such loans.
The adjustable rate mortgages start at 7.65 percent, he said. The average rate for a 30-year fixed-rate loan this week was 6.24 percent, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.
He said none of the loan recipients has defaulted or been deported, and he considers it unlikely.
"For the life of me, I can't remember the report of a deportation in recent times," he said.
In recent years, federal immigration authorities have de-emphasized work site enforcement and gone after illegal immigrants who commit crimes. Work site arrests spiked this year, but the risk of deportation for illegal immigrants who stay out of trouble remains relatively small.
Temple Black, a spokesman for the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the agency that deports illegal immigrants, said the agency has no position on the mortgage loan programs.
But Steve Camarota with the Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington group calling for tighter immigration restrictions, says firms like Bank of Bartlett are unethical.
"You have an institution in the community working to undermine U.S. immigration laws," he said.
But he also blames the federal government, saying it's not serious about immigration enforcement, despite dramatic moves like Congress' vote this fall to build 700 miles of fencing along the border.
"All the more mundane work of enforcing the law, like how you issue tax ID numbers, what instructions you give the bank, all those kinds of things they have no intention of doing," he said.
Byrd said the federal government gave him the idea of extending home loans to illegal immigrants. He said that in 2004 he attended a conference in Chicago at which officials from agencies, including the Federal Reserve and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., encouraged bankers to give services to illegal immigrants.
Spokesmen for the banking regulators say the agencies are urging lenders to extend services to immigrants and others likely to be outside the mainstream financial system. But they say they take no position on lending to illegal immigrants.
"We have neither encouraged or discouraged lending on the basis of immigration status," said Robert Mooney, an FDIC official in Washington.
Other businesses are entering the market.
First Tennessee Bank brokers loans for people without Social Security numbers through Banco Popular, a Puerto Rican firm. National banks, including Wells Fargo & Co. and Citibank, are testing similar programs.
The Memphis Area Teachers' Credit Union offers home loans to people without Social Security numbers, but a spokeswoman said the bank requires proof of legal immigration status.
People selling houses in two new subdivisions in Raleigh, Cedar Ridge and Ridgemont Trails, said they're marketing to immigrants and won't turn away those here illegally.
And immigrants' heavy demand for housing is drawing more agents to the business.
Yeska Castillo, the Carranza sisters' cousin, joined the firm a few months ago. She drives an SUV with an advertising pitch written in Spanish on the back windshield: "Do you want a house? No money? No Social Security? No credit? Yes, it's possible!"
Juan Romo, a part owner in Su Casa, said he's seen the number of Spanish-speaking real estate agents in the Memphis area jump from two or three in 1999 to about 50 today. He said that when people without Social Security numbers buy homes, they help develop the economy.
"They integrate more into Memphis, too," he said. "I don't see any wrong in doing that, really."
-- Daniel Connolly: 529-5296
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Mortgage loans to illegal immigrants
Several local and national banks make home loans to people without Social Security numbers. While some people without Social Security numbers are here legally, many who don't have the numbers are illegal immigrants.
The Bank of Bartlett and other firms offer loans to people without Social Security numbers. First Tennessee Bank brokers similar loans through Banco Popular, a Puerto Rican bank. The Memphis Area Teachers' Credit Union offers loans to people without Social Security numbers, but a spokeswoman said they must have legal status.
Federal banking regulators encourage banks to reach out to the "unbanked," and permit home sales to illegal immigrants, officials with the Federal Reserve and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation said.
Copyright 2006, commercialappeal.com - Memphis, TN. All Rights Reserved.
Thank you, gringo Jorge Boosh!
If that were the case, then the entirety of the government of California would be behind bars.
Hmm...not a bad idea now that I think about it.
Banks, including the Federal Reserve that ENCOURAGE illegal immigration by providing accounts and mortgages to illegals because it is 'profitable', are breaking our own Federal Immigration Laws and are subject to RICO prosecution. All it would take is one bank who refuses to follow this trend to file suit against the others. And just like the current RICO suits against employers of illegals, the OBLers are rushing to pass comprehensive reform that will make them legal, and give both the illegals and their employers amnesty to prevent the RICO suits.
"Another plaintiff that may be able to show injury is the competitor of a financial corporation that accepts the matricula consular or other foreign-issued identification card to open a bank account or engage in other financial services activity. By accepting the card in violation of the INA, the bank or other entity gains a competitive advantage similar to the defendant in Commercial Cleaning. The bank, for example, would unlawfully gain additional account holders, strengthening its competitive position by providing it with additional resources to invest in loans. This unlawful activity would injure competitor banks in a similar way that the plaintiff companies were injured in Commercial Cleaning. The law-abiding competitor banks would potentially lose loan customers because the bank acting unlawfully may be able to provide better loan terms or otherwise gain a competitive advantage due to its strengthened financial position.
Again, this would clearly injure the business capabilities of the competitors and give potential plaintiffs a valid claim under RICO against the offending entities. Knowing that they could be held criminally and civilly liable for such a practice, many businesses might reconsider the practice of accepting matricula consular cards in the future"
Some large U.S. financial corporations currently accept the matricula as primary or secondary ID for the purpose of opening bank accounts in the United States for illegal aliens. An illegal alien with a U.S. bank account, in which he or she may deposit illegally acquired funds, and out of which he or she may pay local rent, local utility bills, and send money abroad, is more likely to remain illegally in the United States. In other words, he or she is encouraged to remain illegally in the United States — such encouragement being a violation of Federal law.
When such a violation is done for the purpose of financial gain, as in the case of the financial corporations engaged in the practice, it is more than simply a violation of immigration law — it is racketeering. Also, those contemplating entering the United States illegally will be further encouraged to do so because of the added benefits they can obtain once they enter. Thus, it is reasonable to say that acceptance of the matricula is a violation of the INA and a predicate offense under RICO...............
With this predicate offense established, a bank that competes with the one accepting the card would only have to plead the other elements of a RICO claim — injury and causation — in order to survive a motion to dismiss and bring the case to trial. The plaintiff bank will likely be able to plead these elements. As mentioned in the discussion of the injury element above, the injury to the plaintiff bank would be lost market share and competitive disadvantage, leaving causation as the only remaining obstacle to receiving compensation for damages.
Under the "direct relation" test, the plaintiff will be able to prove causation. First, the plaintiff bank would be the direct victim of the defendant bank’s illegal activity, similar to the direct injury suffered by Commercial Cleaning at the hands of Colin Service Systems. Second, it will not be difficult to ascertain the damages attributable to the unlawful acceptance of the matricula. Regulations issued by the U.S. Treasury Department require banks to record the type of document used by an account applicant. Thus, the defendant would have records indicating how many accounts were issued on the basis of the matricula alone. Calculations, relatively simple for financial professionals, could then be made to determine the level of business the defendant obtained by its unlawful activity and the impact that that unlawfully gained business had on the market. Third, there is no risk of multiple liabilities due to the presence of second-tier plaintiffs. The plaintiff bank, a first-tier plaintiff, will likely be the only plaintiff with standing to sue since it is the only entity injured by the defendant. Though multiple banks may sue the defendant, all of these banks will be first-tier plaintiffs, so this last factor is not of any concern. Thus, banks accepting the matricula face the real possibility of RICO liability."
http://www.cis.org/articles/2003/back1103.html
It must feel great to go beyond the call of duty and risk your life and finally get home and some greedy S.O.B. treats you like dirt while he treats criminals like royalty. I guess when that happened, you really knew you were home again.
>>And it's about doing business with criminals.
Ah well, one man's criminal is another man's ambassador.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=Arnall+Ameriquest+Inauguration&btnG=Search
Do I hear one million fity?
Going once. Going twice. Sold! to the gentleman from France.
Please pay the cashier.
Ah well, one man's criminal is another man's ambassador.
------
Well put -- that is how the libs and our "elitists" view the illegal Mexicans. Ambassadors of power from their vote. With them, it is not about money, it is about POWER AND CONTROL.
The answer is in. The purchase of homes by illegal aliens IS what is keeping the housing sector propped up, if not booming. If the government deports illegals and builds a fence to keep new ones out, the housing sector will collapse taking the rest of the economy with it. That is WHY the government has done little or nothing to solve this problem. It is also why many groups and the government will not allow muncipalities to make it illegal to hire or rent to illegals. Everything is tied to housing.
Eventually, the economy is going to turn, and there is going to be a LOT of unemployed illegals. The reason they can put $100,000 down is because they don't pay insurance of any kind, if you get hit by an illegal, I guarantee you they will have NO insurance and you will get stuck paying the damage (plus higher rates to cover their bad driving). They also get free health care.
Wish I was in that area because I'd walk in and apply for the same lower rates that are extended to illegals. Then when I was turned down, I'd find the nearest lawyer for discrimination.
A friend of mine moved to CA from OK a few years ago, and I had to help her cash a check because she only had her social security number & car insurance. But if an illegal walks in with a Matricular Consular card and it's no problem!
Uh, Kimberely, could you condense this into Reader's Digest format please?
I worked for almost a year for Provident Bank of Maryland (at several Virginia branches), and we tellers were required to accept the Mexican Matricula Consular as a valid form of ID for check cashing.
Before New Year, I helped out at a Richmond branch, and we had some questionable folks coming in to cash payroll checks. One presented to me his check and a New York Driver's License that did not feel legitimate, so I asked for another form of ID. The man scowled at me and pulled out a Matricula Consular.
The business that my dad used to work for (he was the office manager) hired plenty of illegals. They banked with SunTrust Bank, which was doing brisk business cashing payroll checks.
Believe me, the banks (and now credit unions) do NOT care about your legal status so long as they can make money off you (without the Feds going after them).
Thank goodness I now work for a large military credit union (in their IT department). We don't have that many illegals coming to our branches :P
Maybe they could get a second job in the fields, being a gardner, tending the kids...oh, guess not, 'cuz they speak English. Gringos need not apply. BTW, there is a restaurant that uses the term gringo on their menu,even though it is a impolite term. Can you imagine having a "Wetback Burrito" on the menu? Didn't think so.
Gringa doesn't bother me. "weta"(ms?) does
Well, whatever larger corporation is backing those loans is probably securitizing them and selling them off to investors, so if anyone takes a hit, it will be the investors.
You know the old saying about if it sounds to good. My son graduates next month. They are just going to buy some land a build a house themselves as they go.
Yup...that's why we don't invest in mortgage-backed securities. :P
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