gp
how is Countrywides' bad business practices Bush's fault?
Thanks for the economic leadership, Mr Bush
how is Countrywides' bad business practices Bush's fault?
Thanks for the economic leadership, Mr Bush
failure to enforce existing banking rules,
but that the current aura in D.C. that "anything is legal, if you call it free market enterprise" left many of the overseers hands tied to do anything
Steve said:Oldtimerbut that the current aura in D.C. that "anything is legal, if you call it free market enterprise" left many of the overseers hands tied to do anything
if a law is on the books, how is an investigator/prosecutions hands tied?
If the President/Administration- and his buddy AG"s who wrongly represented the President instead of the people- head attorneys of the regulatory agencies all advise to look somewhere else- or to not enforce them--thats what happens...Thats what the Inspector Generals office said that the GIPSA investigators were being told to do by their administrator, JoAnn Waterfield--"shuffle papers and make it look like your doing something"- and they never filed a case![]()
......
I do not think it would be possible to provide enough Laws and protection for the greed that took over the housing market..
most scams are dependent on the greed of the victim. They are convinced that they are getting something for nothing, or something for a lot less than it's worth, and they are blinded to the truth. You can't con an honest man... :roll:
People in this country have been brought up- programmed that the government has laws, rules, and safety measures that protect them--and put a lot of trust in their government doing that and that major Government licensed institutions have honorable ethical people working for them-- especially when working with their neighborhood bank- not knowing that their loan is going to be sold and resold and that the guarantees their banker gave them face to face will mean nothing...They should be concerned when dealing with the streetcorner shylock or the mafia don-- but not when they working with a licensed lending institution :shock:
I've worked with a lot of folks that have been scammed-- many older people that can't believe these scammers can operate in the open the way they do...Its just that the amount of crooks in many cases have outgrown the number of overseers.....
And its a sad note-- that so many businessmen in this day of Walmart type stores- and world banks are dishonest and cannot be trusted-- and that you can't even buy something without taking along a cadre of attorneys to read the reams of paperwork and small print....
Everyone putting the all mighty dollar above all else!!!
I only hope this scandal and the continuing domino fall behind it doesn't bankrupt our country....
http://graphics8.nytimes.com//images/2008/01/08/business/Countrywide_Transcript.pdfSteve said:.... maybe you could enlighten us to the laws they broke?...
--
18 THE COURT: Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Hold it.
19 Wait a minute. You're saying that you -- there's a letter
20 dated 2003 at a certain address that you weren't in until a
21 subsequent time?
22 MS. STEIDL: Yes, sir.
23 THE COURT: Yet this is a letter that was represented
24 to acknowledge or support the first change notice on this
25 property?
1 MS. STEIDL: Yes, sir. The letter was dated
2 September 22nd, 2003, directed toward my client, carbon copied
3 to Ronda Winnecour and Ken Steidl at the Gulf Tower address,
4 but on September 22nd, 2003, we were at 210 Grant Street. So I
5 just asked Ms. Puida to explain the two, because I didn't
6 understand the discrepancy, and she told me that these letter
7 that they sent -- they sent three -- are recreation letters.
8 They're not the first letter that was sent. They're just --
9 THE COURT: What is a -- never heard of a recreation
10 letter. That's a letter that they don't have, and now they've
11 recreated to support the allegation that they actually sent a
12 prior letter?
13 MS. STEIDL: Well, that would be how it sounds. I
14 don't mean to mis-characterize it, but that's how it sounds.
15 All of these letters were -- there are three of them, and they
16 were all recreated.
17 THE COURT: All recreated letters.
18 MS. STEIDL: That's one in '03, one in '04, and one
19 in '05.
20 THE COURT: Okay. That's pretty interesting. Go
21 ahead.
22 MS. STEIDL: Okay, so --
23 THE COURT: Well, what were the letters purportedly
24 to represent or offer?
25 MS. STEIDL: The change -- apparently, some of the
1 problem was, according to Countrywide, that the loan amounts
2 changed with escrow changes, because she doesn't have a
3 variable rate. It's a fixed rate. So the first letter in
4 September 22nd, 2003, and we didn't move to our new office
5 until October 27th, so there's like a six-week difference
6 there. And it says, "This letter is to advise you that the
7 escrow requirement has changed per the escrow analysis. The
8 amount of the escrow is now this, 2235.07," and it goes on to
9 explain about the escrow. And then it says that they're
10 raising her monthly mortgage payment to 603 from approximately
11 500. We didn't get that letter.
12 THE COURT: All right. Let me -- you said the other
13 two are recreation letters, too. It's not the same -- how do
14 you know that? Based on a same address issue or for other
15 reasons?
16 MS. STEIDL: No, Ms. Puida told me.
17 THE COURT: All right.
18 MS. STEIDL: She said that they put them into
19 evidence when it happened, so we could understand that it
20 happened. That they were recreated.
21 THE COURT: Oh, that's nice. All right, but -- and
22 they allege that they actually sent these letters at one time,
23 but they don't have the originals? Is that it?
24 MS. STEIDL: You would have to ask her. I didn't go
25 that far.
not knowing that their loan is going to be sold and resold and that the guarantees their banker gave them face to face will mean nothing...
and that you can't even buy something without taking along a cadre of attorneys to read the reams of paperwork....
that so many businessmen in this day of Walmart type stores- and world banks are dishonest and cannot be trusted-
People in this country have been brought up- programmed that the government has laws, rules, and safety measures that protect them--and put a lot of trust in their government doing that and that major Government licensed institutions have honorable ethical people working for them-- especially when working with their neighborhood bank
Yes, there is. It is called fraud. misrepresenting what is being bought and sold is illegal. Doing that in the banking industry is called wire fraud and is investigated by the FBI ......PROVIDED the administration entrusted to enforce the law is willing to do so. It is Bush's lack of character and integrity that provided the environment that allowed the other lack of integrity and character to thrive.Steve said:but unfortunatly there is no law against people being dis-honorable nor unethical..
and blaming Bush for others' lack of charactor will not solve anything..
right there's the problem.......your part of Texas you gotta be on drugs just to survive the BS.........backhoeboogie said:Employers are begging for drug free employees.
Cowpuncher said:Backhoeboogie,
I see the same things that you do. There are jobs aplenty for good people that aren't fooling around with drugs and aren't alcholics. Those with a good work ethic will always be in demand.
Those that sit around and whine about it all being someone else's fault would never last in most of the places I have worked. We always sorted them out pretty well in the first interview.
A side light - your comments on welding are pertinent. I spent many years in corporate finance and since, I have learned to do a decent job welding. Any highschool kid that doesn't want to go to college ought to go to trade school and become a journeyman welder.
My daughter was taking a craft class and was shown how to weld. The instructor told her to work at it and $50.00 and hour would be hers - she is a small skinny person who can get into places most men can't. She passed it up. but just shows that there are opportunities there.
Also, its not like the stuff needing welding can be shipped offshore and done by foreign labor!!!
Goldman Sachs: U.S. Recession in 2008
MoneyNews
Wednesday, Jan. 9, 2008
NEW YORK -- Goldman Sachs Wednesday said it expects the U.S. economy to drop into recession this year, prompting the Federal Reserve to slash benchmark lending rates to 2.5 percent by the third quarter.
http://moneynews.newsmax.com/scripts/money/printer.pl?page=http://moneynews.newsmax.com/money/archives/articles/2008/1/9/102603.cfm?s=al&promo_code=42A3-1
Goodpasture said:I am a disciplinary hearing officer for the Oklahoma Real Estate Appraisers Board. We have hearings scheduled, two a week, from now till the middle of February and more in the pipeline. I am filing three complaints this week. The process to get an appraiser complaint to that level requires nearly half a year of investigation. Most of the appraisers that get that far have their license revoked (we do not like to let a guy who performs fraudulent appraisals surrender it....gives him the opportunity to move to Kansas or Texas or some where and start all over again). I also do upgrade work-product reviews, and of the 30 or so I have seen in the past year, 80% were incompetent. I finished such a review this morning about 4. I am seriously considering filing a complaint over the files he submitted as HIS BEST WORK! He has done several hundred appraisals over the past four years, and I bet NONE of them are worth the paper they are written on.
The problem, is this is the STANDARD, not the exception. And if Wall Street took those to the bank, the problems the media is reporting is like saying it was an ice cube that hit the Titanic.
The market is going to be corrected in one of two ways......real estate portfolios are going to be valued at below 50% of last years valuation, or phony money is going to be printed and sent to the investors to instill confidence. If the first, the economy will take a hit and adjust (and the fallout will be tremendous.....everything from Unions funds to insurance funds invested in REITs are going to be turned into toilet paper) and we will hit a major depression. If we print more money, and it kills the dollar (which it will) then we are in for a catastrophic depression.
And yes, virtually every state is scrutinizing appraisers now.
ff said:Goodpasture said:I am a disciplinary hearing officer for the Oklahoma Real Estate Appraisers Board. We have hearings scheduled, two a week, from now till the middle of February and more in the pipeline. I am filing three complaints this week. The process to get an appraiser complaint to that level requires nearly half a year of investigation. Most of the appraisers that get that far have their license revoked (we do not like to let a guy who performs fraudulent appraisals surrender it....gives him the opportunity to move to Kansas or Texas or some where and start all over again). I also do upgrade work-product reviews, and of the 30 or so I have seen in the past year, 80% were incompetent. I finished such a review this morning about 4. I am seriously considering filing a complaint over the files he submitted as HIS BEST WORK! He has done several hundred appraisals over the past four years, and I bet NONE of them are worth the paper they are written on.
The problem, is this is the STANDARD, not the exception. And if Wall Street took those to the bank, the problems the media is reporting is like saying it was an ice cube that hit the Titanic.
The market is going to be corrected in one of two ways......real estate portfolios are going to be valued at below 50% of last years valuation, or phony money is going to be printed and sent to the investors to instill confidence. If the first, the economy will take a hit and adjust (and the fallout will be tremendous.....everything from Unions funds to insurance funds invested in REITs are going to be turned into toilet paper) and we will hit a major depression. If we print more money, and it kills the dollar (which it will) then we are in for a catastrophic depression.
And yes, virtually every state is scrutinizing appraisers now.
From what I read, the Fed is going to continue to throw money at the economy...probably until Bush leaves office. Then it's up to the new president to deal with the financial mess Bush is leaving us.
Prices of properties listed for sale continued to fall in December, dropping in 16 of 20 major markets, while West Coast cities lead the charge.
According to a report from real estate research firms Altos Research and Real IQ, released late Wednesday, San Francisco saw average home prices drop 4.6 percent during the past three months, while Las Vegas, San Diego, Los Angeles and Detroit all registered price declines of over 3 percent.
Many more opportuities to go to work right now than I have ever seen in my life time. Too bad those opportunities weren't around when I was just starting out.