Foreclosures Archives - Page 11 of 57 - Kingcade Garcia McMaken, P.A. Bankruptcy Attorneys

How to Protect Yourself if Renting during a Foreclosure

Posted on June 14, 2017by Admin

Imagine paying your rent on time every month and learning that your landlord is not paying the mortgage. Many tenants find out too late that the home they are renting is in foreclosure. This has become a common problem, particularly in South Florida. If you find yourself in this situation, there are some immediate steps you can take to help protect yourself.

You received a letter from the lender’s attorney advising you about the pending foreclosure. You should call that attorney and ask the following questions:

When and where will the foreclosure sale take place?
Can you start making your rent payment directly to the lender, or place it in escrow?
If the lender purchases the property at the foreclosure sale, will they allow you to reside at the property? If so, for how long?

If you are interested in purchasing the property, at a foreclosure sale it is possible to get a good deal if you are the top bidder. However, before moving forward you should discuss it with your own attorney. A title search will need to be performed before the sale. You will need to know what your rights and obligations will be before purchasing the property.

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Choosing the right attorney can make the difference between whether or not you can keep your home. A well-qualified Miami foreclosure defense attorney will not only help you keep your home, but they will be able to negotiate a loan that has payments you can afford. Miami foreclosure defense attorney Timothy Kingcade has helped many facing foreclosure alleviate their stress by letting them stay in their homes for at least another year, allowing them to re-organize their lives. If you have any questions on the topic of foreclosure please feel free to contact me at (305) 285-9100. You can also find useful consumer information on the Kingcade & Garcia website at www.miamibankruptcy.com.

Debt Relief, Foreclosures, Timothy Kingcade Posts

Seniors Filing More Reverse Mortgage Complaints with CFPB

Posted on June 7, 2017by Admin

Consumers 62 years of age and older face a unique set of financial difficulties- one of their main concerns is servicing issues with reverse mortgages, according to the Monthly Complaint Report released by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).

“Servicing problems with reverse mortgages,” topped the list of complaints among consumers at least 62 years of age, according to the report. These problems oftentimes lead to unexpected foreclosure.

The most-cited concerns were “difficulty with changing the loan terms” and “problems communicating with loan servicers.” In addition to mortgage complaints, seniors also reporter difficulty recovering funds after being financially scammed, fees charged for unauthorized add-on products and services, and confusion surrounding deferred-interest and zero-interest credit cards.

CFPB complaints from older consumers were most common in Florida, California, Texas. The three states accounted for nearly 25 percent of all complaints since 2011.

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Foreclosures, Timothy Kingcade Posts

Foreclosures at New Low, Mortgage Delinquencies Jump

Posted on May 31, 2017by Admin

The number of first-lien mortgage delinquencies increased 13% last month, the largest increase since November 2008. Month-over-month there were 241,000 additional borrowers past due on mortgage payments, according to data from Black Knight Financial. The delinquencies were mostly in their early-stage.

Active foreclosure inventory was at a 10-year low in April and the month also saw the fewest new foreclosure starts since January 2005, only 52,800, down 12.4% from March and 10% year-over-year. Most improved by percentage were New Jersey (14%), Florida (13%), New York (13%), Nevada (11.7%), and DC (9.7%).

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Foreclosures, Timothy Kingcade Posts

Miami–Dade has Second Highest Rate of Repeat Foreclosures in the Nation

Posted on May 17, 2017by Admin

Miami-Dade County has the second-highest rate of repeat foreclosures of any major market, according to a newly released report from Attom Data Solutions. New York City took the number one spot.

Miami-Dade’s rate was 32 percent, followed by Los Angeles County with 39 percent and Maricopa County (Phoenix), with 26 percent, according to Attom’s April 2017 report. New York’s rate was 54 percent.

A repeat foreclosure is defined as a foreclosure start filed in 2016 on a property with an address and owner’s last name combination that also showed a previous foreclosure start with the same property address and owner combination in the last 10 years, according to Attom.

Nationwide foreclosure activity in April dropped to the lowest level since November 2015. Miami-Dade saw its foreclosure rate fall 35 percent in April, year-over-year, to 986 foreclosure filings from 1,509 filings in April 2016.

Miami-Dade’s rate of foreclosures still remains higher than Broward County, which had 730 and Palm Beach County 578 in April.

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Bankruptcy Law, Credit, Debt Relief, Foreclosures, Timothy Kingcade Posts

Dance Moms Reality Star Abby Lee Sentenced to One Year in Prison

Posted on May 10, 2017by Admin

This week Abby Miller, former “Dance Moms” star was sentenced to a year and a day in prison. The reality TV star was charged with hiding $775,000 worth of income and bringing $120,000 worth of Australian currency into the U.S. without reporting it.

U.S. District Judge Joy Flowers Conti also fined Miller $40,000 on top of the $120,000 in currency she is forfeiting as a part of the guilty pleas she entered last year. She was also ordered to spend two years on probation after her prison sentence.

In late 2010, Miller filed for bankruptcy after defaulting on a $245,000 Florida condominium mortgage and a $96,000 mortgage on her Abby Lee Dance Company studio in Penn Hills, outside of Pittsburgh.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Thomas Agresti nearly approved a plan to let her repay her creditors at lower interest rates and longer terms before he saw her on TV one night. Miller had declared in court that she was only making $8,899 per month.

It is a crime to deceive a bankruptcy judge regarding one’s income and assets because that information is used to determine how much and how soon creditors will receive in the court-ordered repayment plan.

She later paid out $288,000 in TV income she did not initially report in 2012, then the federal investigators found that she had hidden nearly $550,000 more from personal appearances, dance sessions and merchandise sales.

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If you are in financial crisis and considering filing for bankruptcy, contact an experienced Miami bankruptcy attorney who can advise you of all your options. As an experienced CPA as well as a proven bankruptcy lawyer, Timothy Kingcade knows how to help clients take full advantage of the bankruptcy laws to protect their assets and get successful results. Since 1996 Kingcade & Garcia, P.A. has been helping people from all walks of life build a better tomorrow. Our attorneys’ help thousands of people every year take advantage of their rights under bankruptcy protection to restart, rebuild and recover. The day you hire our firm, we will contact your creditors to stop the harassment. You can also find useful consumer information on the Kingcade & Garcia website at www.miamibankruptcy.com.

Foreclosures, Timothy Kingcade Posts

Cities Can Sue over Predatory Mortgage Lending but the Standard is high

Posted on May 9, 2017by Admin

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that cities can sue banks over predatory mortgage lending to minorities that harms municipal finances, but cast doubt on whether these cases can succeed by throwing out a lower court decision (ruling 8-0) that had allowed litigation brought by the city of Miami to even move forward.

Miami accused Wells Fargo, Bank of America and Citigroup into pushing “non-white” borrowers into higher-cost and riskier loans they often could not afford, even if they had decent credit. As a result of these alleged discriminatory lending practices, property values declined due to the high rate of loan defaults, which led to foreclosures. The city of Miami said it lost property tax revenue and was forced to pay to repair and maintain the properties that went into foreclosure.

Justice Stephen Breyer said Miami had the legal standing to sue the banks, but needed to present more evidence that the injuries it claims to have suffered were tied to alleged violations of the federal Fair Housing Act. Miami accused the banks of a decade of lending discrimination in its residential housing market. Los Angeles, Oakland and several other U.S. cities have filed similar lawsuits.

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Credit, Debt Relief, Foreclosures, Timothy Kingcade Posts

New Lawsuit Accuses Ocwen Financial Corp. of filing bad foreclosures… Again

Posted on April 27, 2017by Admin

A lawsuit filed by the State of Florida alleges Ocwen Financial Corp.’s errors have resulted in “significant harm to borrowers, including but not limited to improper late fees, inaccurate negative credit reporting and borrower frustration.”

Twenty states have filed similar actions, along with the federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The Florida lawsuit, filed by the state Attorney General and the Florida Office of Financial Regulation, says the West Palm Beach-based company filed illegal foreclosures, mishandled loan modifications, misapplied mortgage payments, failed to pay insurance premiums from escrow and collected excessive fees.

“When Ocwen has sent escrow statements, in many instances the escrow statements have contained inaccurate information pertaining to the borrowers’ account histories, escrow balances, and escrow payments,” the lawsuit said.

The complaint filed in federal court in West Palm Beach alleges violations of the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act, the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act and Chapter 494, Florida Statutes.

This is not the first time Ocwen has been accused of foreclosure misconduct. In 2014, a court approved a $2.1 billion settlement between Ocwen and 49 states, as well as the District of Columbia and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, to address allegations of Ocwen’s mortgage servicing misconduct.

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Debt Relief, Foreclosures, Timothy Kingcade Posts

Florida Couple Triumphs in Foreclosure Appeal

Posted on April 24, 2017by Admin

A Florida couple won an appeal in a foreclosure ruling by the 4^th District Court of Appeal of Florida. The appeals court determined the couple had a valid case and overturned the trial court’s decision, favoring the borrowers and that the bank, “failed to establish standing.”

In 2008, the couple defaulted on a loan three years after they signed a mortgage with the original lender, Bankers Mortgage Trust Inc. The couple was accused of two counts: 1. mortgage foreclosure and 2. “reestablishing” a note that was allegedly lost. A piece of paper attached to the copy of the note approved the new owner of the loan from the original lender to GreenPoint Mortgage Funding Inc. The claim about the lost note was dismissed after the bank failed to prove that it was the “legal and/or equitable owner and holder of the Note and Mortgage and (had) the right to enforce the loan documents.”

It didn’t help the bank when their sole witness, Pamela Bingham, who worked as a home lending research officer, couldn’t determine when the approval for GreenPoint Mortgage to take over the loan was included in the note or whether it was on the back or on another piece of paper, according to court documents.

The couple filed an appeal alleging the bank never provided valid evidence that it received the note from the original lender, and therefore it could not win the case as a non-holder in position with the rights of the holder.

“There was nothing, however, connecting the bank the endorsee of the note, GreenPoint Mortgage, to EMC Mortgage or the Bank,” according to the court. “In other words, the Bank failed to prove the series of transactions through which it purportedly acquired the note from the endorsee.”

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Bankruptcy Law, Credit, Debt Relief, Foreclosures, Timothy Kingcade Posts

Why are mortgages getting cheaper?

Posted on April 19, 2017by Admin

The average rate of a 30-year fixed mortgage fell to 4.08% this week, the fourth consecutive week of declines and the lowest level this year, according to Freddie Mac.

A higher Federal Funds rate makes it more expensive for banks to borrow money, which can translate into higher borrowing rates for consumers. But recent global uncertainty and signs that the White House might not be as productive with its agenda as many thought has caused yields to recently fall. The 10-year Treasury yield is around 2.23%, down from around 2.62% nearly a month ago. Mortgage rates have moved lower as well.

Freddie Mac predicts that we will see rates increase to around 4.5% by the end of the year. Potential home buyers should welcome the drop in rates with open arms as the busy buying season heats up.

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Bankruptcy Law, Credit, Debt Relief, Foreclosures, Timothy Kingcade Posts

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Fines Bank of America $45 Million

Posted on April 13, 2017by Admin

Judge Christopher Klein of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Sacramento issued a $45 million fine against Bank of America Corp., calling the treatment of a California couple who fought to save their home “brazen” and “heartless.” According to Judge Klein, the bank’s mortgage modification process and mistaken foreclosure on Erik and Renee Sundquist’s home left them in a “state of battle-fatigued demoralization.”

“It is apparent that the engine of Bank of America’s problem in this case is one of corporate culture… not rogue employees betraying an upstanding employer,” Judge Klein said. He added that he hopes the fine is large enough that it will not be “laughed off in the boardroom as petty cash or ‘chump change’.” Most of the money from the fine will go to law schools and consumer advocacy organizations.

The Sundquists’ financial troubles started in 2008 after their construction business closed down due to the economic downturn. The couple later bought a cheaper home outside of Sacramento and borrowed approximately $590,000 from a lender that was later taken over by Bank of America. After which, the bank promised them that they could request lower monthly payments. However, in 2009 when the couple stopped making payments, Bank of America officials said they would not consider a loan modification. Over the next few years, the couple requested loan modifications approximately 20 times. Each time their requests were “routinely either lost or declared insufficient, or incomplete or stale or in need of resubmission or denied without comprehensible explanation,” the ruling said.

In 2010 the couple filed for bankruptcy which halts foreclosure sales. However, the bank still improperly took over the home and gave them a three-day eviction notice. A few weeks after the couple moved out, Ms. Sundquist was hospitalized with stress-related heart attack symptoms.

Bank of America later reversed the sale but never formally notified the couple of the change. According to the ruling, they moved back in several months later.

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