FREEPER DB POSTED Here's what illegals did in my area: Family member buys house and gets teaser loan. Family member sells house to another family member for $50k more. That family member gets teaser loan. That family member sells house to yet another family member for even more again getting a teaser loan. They repeat this multiple times. The last family member defaults on the loan and goes back to Mexico. The other family members walk away with a couple hundred thousand dollars of the banks money through all the repeated selling between family members. No one is accountable. Now repeat this on a broad scale and you can get an idea of what was going on..."
ANOTHER FREEPER POSTED What we have seen in our area is a little less complex: An illegal or legal buys a home. They rent out the garage to 4 or 5 illegals for 3-5 thousand per month. Then, each spare bedroom in the house gets another 2-4 illegals at 2-4 thousand per month. None of this is ever declared as income. The home owners drive Lincoln Navigators and Tundra pickups. Down in E. Contra Costra county, the same thing happens, except the vehicles of choice were Hummers and Escalades.
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The Miami Herald found that more than 10,000 people with criminal histories -- including bank robbers and land swindlers -- were able to peddle home loans across the state this decade. Of those, more than 4,000 cleared OFR background checks despite criminal pasts, with most committing offenses that state law required the agency to screen -- fraud, dishonest dealing and crimes of ``moral turpitude.''
Florida Comes Clean, Allowed Criminals to Enter Mortgage Industry, to Prey on Consumers
September 18, 2008, Miami Herald
In a stinging critique of the state's oversight of the mortgage industry, top Florida investigators found that state regulators failed to alert police agencies to crooked mortgage brokerages, ignored citizen complaints and allowed hundreds of people with criminal histories to peddle loans.
The report released Tuesday to Gov. Charlie Crist and the Cabinet criticized the Office of Financial Regulation, saying the agency broke down in key areas, including screening brokers and shutting down shoddy operations, while the state grappled with the nation's worst home loan fraud crisis.
Investigators said the agency functioned without clear guidelines, making up rules as it went along and operating at times on wrong interpretations of the law. All the while, mortgage fraud skyrocketed during the most explosive housing boom in state history. Today, a quarter of all reported fraudulent loans across the country are for Florida properties. The Miami Herald found that more than 10,000 people with criminal histories -- including bank robbers and land swindlers -- were able to peddle home loans across the state this decade. Of those, more than 4,000 cleared OFR background checks despite criminal pasts, with most committing offenses that state law required the agency to screen -- fraud, dishonest dealing and crimes of ``moral turpitude.''
The newspaper found that convicted criminals went on to steal at least $85 million from consumers and lenders. In fact, the state report showed, there were even more problems with the background checks. Auditors found that state regulators failed to conduct federal background checks or submit fingerprint cards of the applicants to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement until March of this year -- just days after The Herald made a series of requests for the criminal histories of mortgage brokers.
The auditors found the agency was relying on birthdates and Social Security numbers to do background checks, leaving fingerprint cards -- crucial to determining criminal histories -- in office files, unused.
The Miami Herald found 88 former federal criminals were licensed by regulators, including former bank robbers. While state auditors found 588 people with serious criminal backgrounds who were granted licenses since 2003, The Herald examined brokers from the entire decade, finding 2,000 with felonies, and another 2,000 guilty of lesser crimes. The Herald's investigation also found scores of brokers were able to commit crimes while licensed -- including mortgage fraud -- and stay in the business.
The two enforcement arms -- administrative and criminal -- rarely communicated, the report found. Agency examiners were often kept in the dark on law enforcement investigations, and as a result, rarely pulled brokers from the business. Of the 51 criminal cases closed by the office between 2003 and 2007, the report found only one resulted in a license revocation. In addition, investigators found a 40 percent decrease in examinations of licensed mortgage brokers between 2003 and 2007 -- even as the numbers of brokers nearly tripled.
Further, auditors found that, in some cases, the agency failed to warn law enforcement of crooked brokers and boiler rooms, and that penalties imposed on bad brokers were often inadequate and far lower than proceeds from a single illicit mortgage transaction.
The report also noted that telephone complaints about bad brokers were not recorded by state agents or even acted upon. Separately, the report found that loan originators -- the largest segment of mortgage professionals in Florida -- do the same work as mortgage brokers but aren't licensed.
Saxon told auditors that licensing loan originators would be next to impossible because of the ``influence of the industry.'' But industry leaders in Florida told The Miami Herald they had asked Saxon's office in 2002 and 2006 to license loan originators -- but regulators refused. Blog credits Miami Herald http://ciercus.blogs.com/mortgage_fraud_blog/2008/09/florida-comes-clean-allowed-criminals-to-enter-mortgage-industry-prey-on-consumers.html
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Husband And Wife Plead Guilty To Massive Florida Straw Buyer Scheme ("God's children" $15M fraud)
by Staff Reporter on 06/02/08 at 03:25 AM
FR POSTED several times
Juan and Rachael Torrens pled guilty to conspiracy charges in connection with their participation in a recent multi-million dollar mortgage fraud scheme in South Florida. The defendants acknowledged as part of their guilty plea that their scheme produced over $15,000,000 in fraudulent loans, and resulted in losses of over $5,000,000 to various lenders. With Juan and Rachael Torrens‘ guilty pleas, 15 of the original 31 defendants charged have pled guilty.
As previously reported by Mortgage Fraud Blog, defendants Juan Torrens, the de facto owner of Amsouth Trust & Investment Corp. (”Amsouth”) and president of Countryside Land & Development, Inc., Rachael Torrens, president of 1st Choice Realty of South Florida, Inc. and de facto owner of First United Mortgage USA Corp., Daniel Ramos, Alfonso A. Muxo, a State of Florida certified real estate appraiser and owner of Palm Bay Real Estate Appraisals, Inc., and Katherine Harris, former president and part owner of Floridian Home Title Corporation, were charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and/or wire fraud for their participation in this massive mortgage fraud scheme. The scheme involved fraudulent mortgage loans obtained for the purchase of 28 properties located in Miami-Dade and Broward Counties, Florida, and in the City of Marco Island. All except Katherine Harris have already pled guilty, and are awaiting sentence.
The Indictment also charges defendants Mario E. Diaz, Aurelio Pozo, Oscar Barreiro, Lellany Rordriguez, Jose Asensi, Carlos Morales, Damaris Jimenez, Lizabeth Perez, Mario Blanco, Rene Rodriguez, Tamaris Angulo, Alicia Loaiza, Ester Crespo, Jesus Enrique Guevara, Janette Lugo, Priscilla Fleitas, Erick Clavijo, Luis DeJesus Planas, Moises Llorens, Milva Roque, Aurora Ramentol, Gladys Lens, Nancy Fundora, Yanny Cruz Pavon, Roger Rosario and Jacqueline Perez-Castillo ("the straw buyer defendants") with wire fraud for their participation in this mortgage fraud scheme. To date, guilty pleas have been entered by defendants Aurelio Pozo, Oscar Barreiro, Carlos Morales, Damaris Jimenez, Mario Blanco, Jesus Enrique Guevara, Janette Lugo, Priscilla Fleitas, Moises Llorens, Gladys Lens, and Roger Rosario.
According to the Indictment, Juan Torrens would identify sellers of residential properties who were willing to overstate the true selling price of their properties. Daniel Ramos and Juan Torrens would then recruit and pay the straw buyer defendants to pose as buyers and ostensibly participate in the purchase of the selected properties. Defendants Rachael Torrens and Juan Torrens would prepare fraudulent mortgage loan applications for the straw purchasers that included false employment verifications, pay stubs, income and funds on deposit, and IRS Forms W-2.
Thereafter, to support the overstated sales prices on the properties and the fraudulent mortgage applications, defendant Alonso A. Muxo would prepare fraudulent appraisals attesting to the inflated property values dictated by Juan Torrens. Roger Rosario, an employee of Regions Bank, assisted the fraud by providing, on at least one occasion, a fraudulent verification of deposit in connection with a mortgage loan application for one of the straw buyer defendants.
To effectuate the scheme, defendants Juan Torrens and Rachael Torrens, together with the straw buyer defendants, would create and submit to the banks and lending institutions HUD-Settlement Statement Forms, also known as HUD-1s, which falsely stated that the straw buyers brought their own funds to the closings. Once the mortgage applications were approved, the lenders would wire the loan proceeds to the title company, Floridian Home Title, for closing.
At closing, Amsouth, a company owned and controlled by Juan Torrens, would receive a credit for the difference between the inflated price and the actual selling price of the property. Defendants Juan and Rachael Torrens would make the payments on the mortgage loans to maintain the loans afloat until the properties could be resold again, often to another straw buyer. When the Torrenses failed to make payments on the loans, some properties went into foreclosure, resulting in substantial losses to the lending institutions.
http://www.mortgagefraudblog.com/index.php/weblog/comments/husband_and_wife_plead_guilty_to_massive_florida_straw_buyer_scheme/