GMAC Residential Capital Lists 200-999 Creditors, Failing to Disclose Tens of Thousands of Homeowner Claims

GMAC Residential Capital Lists 200-999 Creditors, Failing to Disclose Tens of Thousands of Homeowner Claims

By Daniel Edstrom
DTC Systems, Inc.

Note that the original article has been updated to fix my mistake of showing 299 creditors when the number of creditors listed on the Voluntary Petition was 200-999.  On April 13, 2011 the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation issued a Cease and Desist Consent Order against Ally Financial Inc. fka GMAC LLC, Ally Bank fka GMAC Bank, Residential Capital LLC (and its direct and indirect subsidiaries) and GMAC Mortgage LLC.  During the period of 1/1/2009 to 12/31/2010, the Mortgage Servicing Companies completed 89,998 foreclosure actions, representing less than 4 percent of the Servicing Portfolio over such such time period.  View the attached Voluntary Petition below to see the number of creditors identified.   The regulators found the following:

WHEREAS, in connection with the process leading to certain foreclosures involving the Servicing Portfolio, the Mortgage Servicing Companies allegedly:

  1. Filed or caused to be filed in state courts and in connection with bankruptcy proceedings in federal courts numerous affidavits executed by employees of the Mortgage Servicing Companies or employees of third-party providers making various assertions, such as the ownership of the mortgage note and mortgage, the amount of principal and interest due, and the fees and expenses chargeable to the borrower, in which the affiant represented that the assertions in the affidavit were made based on personal knowledge or based on a review by the affiant of the relevant books and records, when, in many cases, they were not based on such knowledge or review;
  2. Filed or caused to be filed in courts in various states and in connection with bankruptcy proceedings in federal courts or in the local land record offices, numerous affidavits and other mortgage-related documents that were not properly notarized, including those not signed or affirmed in the presence of a notary;
  3. Litigated foreclosure and bankruptcy proceedings and initiated non-judicial foreclosures without always confirming that documentation of ownership was in order at the appropriate time, including confirming that the promissory note and mortgage document were properly endorsed or assigned and, if necessary, in the possession of the appropriate party;
  4. Failed to respond in a sufficient and timely manner to the increased level of foreclosures by increasing financial, staffing, and managerial resources to ensure that the Mortgage Servicing Companies adequately handled the foreclosure process; and failed to respond in a sufficient and timely manner to the increased level of Loss Mitigation Activities to ensure timely, effective and efficient communication with borrowers with respect to Loss Mitigation Activities and foreclosure activities; and
  5. Failed to have adequate internal controls, policies and procedures, compliance risk management, internal audit, training, and oversight of the foreclosure process, including sufficient oversight of outside counsel and other third-party providers handling foreclosure-related services with respect to the Servicing Portfolio. Continue reading “GMAC Residential Capital Lists 200-999 Creditors, Failing to Disclose Tens of Thousands of Homeowner Claims”

Who is Responsible for the Conduct of Foreclosure Mill Law Firms?

Who is Responsible for the Conduct of Foreclosure Mill Law Firms?

By Daniel Edstrom
DTC Systems, Inc.

Here is the analysis, which comes word for word from the Interagency review of Foreclosure Policies and Practices in 2010 (available here: http://dtc-systems.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/InterAgency_Review_4900701.pdf).

The Federal Reserve System, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), and the Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS), referred to as the agencies, conducted on-site reviews of foreclosure processing at 14 federally regulated mortgage servicers during the fourth quarter of 2010.

This report provides a summary of the review findings and an overview of the potential impacts associated with instances of foreclosure-processing weaknesses that occurred industrywide. In addition, this report discusses the supervisory response made public simultaneous with the issuance of this report, as well as expectations going forward to address the cited deficiencies. The supervisory measures employed by the agencies are intended to ensure safe and sound mortgage-servicing and foreclosure processing business practices are implemented. The report also provides an overview of how national standards for mortgage servicing can help address specific industrywide weaknesses identified during these reviews. Continue reading “Who is Responsible for the Conduct of Foreclosure Mill Law Firms?”