Mortgage Fraud on the Rise!
This article is particularly disturbing. I’m sure we can all remember when it seemed that anyone could qualify for a home and that income statements could be “written on a bar napkin”. In Maricopa Arizona, where the housing boom was fueled by new home builders, appraisors also got in on the action. Buyers, almost forced to use the builders’ lenders, continued to receive favorable appraisals even when the market was beginning to turn south.
I imagine that a lot of these latest findings have to do with the “flopping” and flipping” issues that are now taking place in our market. In addition, I also notice that the builders that remain seem to be able to get their in-house financing done for their homes that are priced well above market price. I’m all for propping up home values but it makes me wonder if we are starting to see the same vicious cycle begin to repaet it self.
New regulations and costly requirements have “cleaned up” the mortage industry lately. Mortgage brokers now actually have to have a certain level of education and knowledge (what a novel thought). That being said, due to the high volume os transactions that we participate in, I have experiienced a number of lenders that appear to “push the envelope” to get buyers qualified.
Only time will tell but I hope that we are not headed down the same road of predatory lening again!
