Does anyone else think this is really F'ed up
Real Estate Investor · Geneva, IL · Member since 2010 · 82 posts · 29 votes
And Obama just vetoed a bill that would make it easier for banks to foreclose. Can anyone out there tell me a story about someone that has been paying there mortgage and was accidentally foreclosed on?????? Who is this protecting? Love the philosophy behind this.
http://www.illinoisattorneygeneral.gov/pressroom/2010_10/20101007b.html
On the news last night: Congress is trying to get a bill passed that will stop foreclosures. Now I can''t remember who said it; just rolled my eyes and went about my business. It would have either been on NBC News or The Nightly Business report because my local news never ever says anything anti-government.
Seems to me that stopping foreclosures amounts to illegal seizure of the bank's assets. Seize the house from the banks, gift it to the deadbeat who won't pay his mortgage.
Eric, they are all low-tax countries. You have to look at total taxes as a percent of GDP when evaluating tax rates because different countries have different systems of taxes.
The small vs big argument is simply one without any basis in reality. I would actually think that an efficient organization should be measured by economies of scale and, the larger the economy, the lower the taxes need to be in order to provide equivalent government services.
None of these countries is going to provide the exact set of services to satisfy any political party in the U.S. because these governments cater to the perceived needs of their people, not Dems or Republicans. My main point was to show you that efficient and small government is possible and is actually in existence right now.
Way to completely exaggerate the case. No one says stop all human activity. So why go the extreme? The question is whether laws should be passed right now to ACCELERATE the foreclosure process in light of new information that indicates errors are likely.
The only people putting the brakes on FC right now are the companies themselves. not the govt. Why would BofA stop all FC on their own? because they know there is a big problem that has been uncovered. If they were confident they were not making mistakes they would keep going.
The government is not stopping anything, they are just saying don't go faster, don't make the process easier right now.
Very interesting....it's still vetoed.
Just thinking of the comment concerning individual criminals and corporate criminals.
If someone comes to your house and says he owns it, punches out the lock and shoot the guy or you point your gun at him and wait for the police, the guy will get hauled off or arrested and hauled off to jail.
If a corporate representative puches the lock out and you shoot the guy or point your gunat him, the police will show up. Now let's assume you did not shoot him. He shows the cop whatever he likes and mentions XYZ Bank. Most likely, the cop will arrest you, take your gun and you'll be charged with a felony go to jail and lose your right to own a gun.
Individuals in corporations are rarely held personally liable for illegal actions, you on the other hand will go to jail!
I can go dig up your old post if you need for me to. I called out this bs in the other post too and you didn't every respond. Your assertion that EVERYBODY wants the government to bail them out when they are in trouble is ridiculous. There are some upstanding people in this country that believe in rugged individualism and the freedom to make or break your own way. There are also others that believe the government should be all things to all people. Fine...vote with your feet. If you want to live in a leftist state then move there and pay the taxes. Don't ask my state to start footing your bills at the national level though when your state can't manage its affairs properly...and don't try to pass some national level laws on the foreclosure process when the system can work just fine as-is. Enforce the laws we already have.
The government is the problem....not the solution to problems. If the free market for money was allowed to rule none of this would have ever happened. If there are people that got a raw deal with the banks cutting corners I feel sorry for them. To throw the baby out with the bath water because of a minute amount of cases is dumb to me. Fix the problem cases in the courts and move on with life. A few hefty lawsuits will cause the banks to rethink the corner cutting in the short run.
Both sides need to man up and take responsibility but unfortunately the banks with their now big fat bailout checks from our wonderful government feel that they don't need to take responsibility anymore now that big bro is backing them up.
Nice wonderful system we have in place here!!!!!
J Scott, you are focusing on the act and not the intent. In common law countries, a crime (as opposed to a civil offense) requires two things: (a) a wrongful act -actus reus and (b) guilty mind - mens rea.
There is an old Latin phrase that explains this well and translates as follows: "The act does not make a person guilty unless the mind be also guilty." (actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea)
If a bank intentionally foreclosures on the house of a person who it knows is current on his mortgage payment, or if it "forecloses" fraudulently on the wrong house knowing that it is the wrong house, then you are right that it would be a criminal matter under current laws.
But if you are doing a million foreclosures and there are some paperwork errors that result in a few wrong foreclosures, it does not become a crime that is comparable to burglary, etc. Instead, it is an error on the part of the bank and one for which the bank should be legally liable in a civil suit for damages.
We live in a time where we have an anti-business media that is ready and willing to jump on any errors made by businesses. People are hungry for such stories and politicians are able to fan the flames in order to win some extra votes. It is in this context that we should see the freeze on judicial foreclosures - it is not so much an admission of guilt as an awareness that perfection is the minimum standard for unpopular groups in a democracy that is out of control.
Well I guess that is why we have a healthy court system in this country. My personal opinion is that the banks are just incompetent like any large, bloated, bureaucratic system is. If they are found to be negligent I would think that hitting their bottom line would do more good than throwing someone in jail because they processed paperwork improperly.
I tend to also think that the bulk of the problem is doing so many foreclosures with so few resources. They either need to hire more people or pay more in suits for screwing things up. We gave them several hundred billion dollars so you would think they can afford it.
Call me old-fashioned, but why not just let the negligent banks get sued and go out of business? There are plenty of other banks to take the market share and the system will work just fine...the way capitalism is SUPPOSED to work. Why do we need all of these "new" laws on the books when the system works just fine if we enforce the current laws?
Why do we need government-subsidized money for mortgages too? Why not just let the free market do its thing?
Sounds good...in theory...
In reality, the legal costs associated with suing a major corporation would likely bankrupt the plaintiffs long before it
had any major impact on the company...
I check these records every day for errors. Most of the errors that I find are either the wrong parcel number but the correct address, or a typo in the address but the correct parcel number, or sometimes the wrong recording number, etc. In the end, the correct house gets sold and the deadbeat is just looking for an excuse to void the foreclosure without paying the mortgage.
Well I think the tobacco companies may disagree with you here. If the problem is big enough to merit a whole new set of laws surely some hungry lawyer would be willing to file a class action lawsuit on behalf of all of the folks that are influenced.
We don't need a new set of laws on the books every time someone is wronged. What we need to do is to enforce the laws we already have.
I also agree that the problem is overblown. The media is in the business of selling ads...not reporting the truth. For every 1 person that is wrongfully foreclosed on there are likely 100,000 correct cases. The people that are hurt by the wrongful filings are welcome to seek restitution in the court system.
Speaking of collateral, personal property doesn't require much at all to declare an event of default. I found more abuses there, where required notices are not given at all, yet the bank claims they sent it, and since they are not required to be accomplished by registered mail or public notice, no proof is required. No doubt about it, banks cheat. It can be part of thier operating proceedure or it can boil down to a lazy employee slacking off.