The Mortgage Thread
Spawing a new thread based on the long running discussion we had on Turd's blog post:
https://www.tfmetalsreport.com/blog/1411/three-years-and-things-are-only...
I'm going to try to consolidate resources here in this top thread for future reference.
Search string to all things 'Mortgage' related here in Turdistan:
https://www.tfmetalsreport.com/search/google?cx=partner-pub-997022349392...
From CD:
There is a regular contributor on ZH whose site may have additional resources/info on the topic of MERS/titles/notes etc.:
From CaliforniaLawyer (and a huge thanks to your contributions to the discussion, very helpful):
This is THE most knowledgeable attorney I have ever come across on this whole area of law. She is utterly fearless, and amazing. She emails on a listserve, which I read all the time. I have never spoken to her. I know she is extremely knowledgeable on all of this, and she works for a legal aid organization.
You may want to send her an email, and see what resources she has for you. Good luck.
p.s. I never got involved in this in California because there were so many shysters jumping into the arena, making incredibly misleading promises they could never deliver upon, defrauding people, taking advantage of the situation. It got so bad that the legislature enacted a law that prevents anyone from taking cash up front at all regarding trying to help struggling homeowners. The law did not carve out attorneys. So, attorneys have to work for free, or lose their license for trying to take an hourly fee helping a homeowner. I kid you not, that is the law here in Cali. Bank lawyers can take hourly fees, but homeowners attorneys cannot. The law is being challenged, but for now, the deck is stacked against the homeowners and way in favor of the banks.
There is a lot more I can say about all this, but perhaps on another thread.
I just re-read my post and realized I forgot to include April Charney's email! Oops!
Here it is: April[at]jaxlegalaid[dot]org.
*****
Let me summarize my situation, I believe many of you may be in similar; I took the red pill with the 2008 crash/fiasco. That prior summer we had sold a home in one of the hotter neighborhoods of this medium sized souther financial center. I had bought the house after relocating from Boston, MA, and we made a killing on it (100K+ nominal $) in just 3 years. I thought it was insane, the price we paid initially AND the price we sold for later. My guts told me it just wasn't right, or normal in any way. I pressed the RE Agent multiple times on it, and they said well, that's the market!
We did the 'responsible' thing and bought a house in a bit further out 'burb, 50's-60's hood, for less than we sold the '30's house for. Put $50K in a 529 for my daughter, did 20% down. Refi'd in Jan '09 I believe, 30 year fixed, 4.625%. I hadn't yet reached the point of awareness that I have now.
So, when we look at the multi-six-figure financial albatross we have strung from our necks with this home, I experience Cognitive Dissonance. By the way I'm a big fan of CD on ZH, if you're the same CD here, hat tips your way buddy.
On the one hand, I feel just like Code the Plumber in this post.
On the other hand, I wonder if the more prudent and fiscally responsible long term decision for us and the nation (seriously!) is to walk away to hasten the burn. I'm in the camp that this patient can't be saved and we'll have to hit the reset button. America will have to start anew with sound money and rule of law. America 2.0.
Walking away is tough. We love our house, our hood, and are making the plans and neighbor relationships to withstand the upcoming storm. I prescribe to Ferfal's real world scenario of SHTF based on his experiences in Argentina. So I'm not so much interested in mobility with liquid assets as much as I am riding it out with my squad here.
Finally, around to the point of why I raised the 'Show me the Note' question. I'm going to pay my mortgage until I can't. I want to make sure that the party on the other side of my contract can legally execute on their obligation to transfer clear title to me at the end of this. Not because I want to weasel out of my obligation on a technicality.
I hope we can explore the steps to take to protect our property such as it is in this thread, and also welcome the moral debate to rage on. We need to have that too. I can see arguments for bailing/abandoning/forclosure, and for sticking it out as long as you can, I am against squatting but understand why people feel justified doing it.
Discuss, share resources, experiences. Thanks.
