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Bankruptcy Lanigan & Lanigan, P.L.
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Banks Take Money Not Owed and Falsify Documents

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It is hard to believe that banks take money not owed and falsify documents. Just how low will a bank go to collect money, even if it is not owed by the homeowner?

Apparently very low. Documents are robo-signed–fast, sloppy, unidentified signatures from signers with names found in multiple locations on documents–allowing banks to collect money on loans they do not own. 

Then, the bank or lender who owns the loan, legally, comes forward to tell an unsuspecting homeowner that the loan is overdue. As the holder of the loan, the bank files a foreclosure lawsuit against the confused homeowner and the chaos in a seemingly unfair foreclosure lawsuit begins.

Winter Park, Florida, attorney Eric Lanigan tells homeowners to be aware and check frequently what bank owns the note on your mortgage. Eric has seen cases where banks that do not own a mortgage collect funds for years.

How Banks Take Money Not Owed and Falsify Documents

Watch the video  Eric explains he’s seen banks and lenders take money not due from homeowners.

Find and watch the to learn about foreclosure, mortgage workout options, how the foreclosure process works, new Florida Foreclosure law and many more. 

The Robo-Signing and constant buying and selling of mortgages has left the industry in chaos. Homeowners who have had foreclosure lawsuits filed against them are unknowing victims of greedy banks with careless billing and accounting practices. 

How to Catch Deceitful Banks: Forensic Audits

One is a forensic audit. A forensic audit catches errors by analyzing charged interest rates vs. what the actual mortgage documents and original loan papers state were actually supposed to be charged to a homeowner.

Eric said that it’s incredible how many times the interest paid for three, five, even fifteen years is different from the interest rate that the documents state a homeowner was supposed to be charged.

There are fees and escrows that are supposed to be taking place that are absolutely wrong. When discovered by a cautious and thorough legal team the penalties for this can be major for doing this mistakenly to an unsuspecting homeowner. 

Unidentified People Have Signed Mortgages — In Several Places

Eric Lanigan and Roddy Lanigan of Lanigan and Lanigan in Winter Park, Florida and Orlando, Florida, have seen documents with one person–the same person–signing for two different companies within the same week.

“The question is who does this person work for?” Eric said. “Is it the company on Note A or the company on Note C? Do they work for company noted on Note B?

“It has not been caught because the document hasn’t been reviewed. Nobody has uncovered the truth, therefore it is NEVER uncovered and no one who knows is going to tell a homeowner about the error.”

It is not in the banks interest to tell a homeowner the mistake is made. 

What is a homeowner to do and how can a homeowner bring it up? How do you know that these things are going on? This is where a promissory note and a mortgage need to have a securitization audit or a forensic audit.

Promissory Note Bait and Switch: Your Mortgage Sold Several Times

Eric explains that promissory notes and mortgages are sold and transferred from one bank to the next. It’s similar to endorsing a check where someone writes on the back of the check: pay to the order of X. The bank signs it and transfers ownership of that check to X.

This occurs when a bank sells your mortgage loan and the accompanying promissory note to another lender. Banks must have an endorsement stating “pay to the order of” the buyer. But because of Robo-Signing where loans were passed around quickly, but there were no signatures but it is a home that has to be foreclosed–a lawsuit needs to be filed. but suddenly there are no endorsements.

Banks and lenders, Eric Lanigan has seen, have back dated signatures, illegally so that the banks can show that, well, the property did change hands and well, see right here, this is the signature.

Yes, Eric Lanigan and Roddy Lanigan have seen paper work and have worked on cases where fraudulently backdated and signed paperwork was completed by people who didn’t even work at the entity at the time it was being assigned. Yet, the paperwork was signed illegally.

Catch Lying Banks in a Securitization Audits to Trace Loan History

A securitization audit traces loan history. It’s an audit that gets right down to who’s actually got the right to file a foreclosure lawsuit against the homeowner. Because the wrong lenders are filing foreclosure lawsuits all the time. But homeowners can’t believe that a bank would deceive them. 

Wake up homeowners! The entirety of the mortgage industry deceit begins and ends with the deception that the banking and lending industry has acted on.
A securitization audit tracks the history of the loan step by step looking at paperwork to find out who bought it, who sold it and the fact that it bounced from one bank to another to another.

When the mass of bad loans were bundled and sold on Wall Street, the chaos began. Who really owned or owns those loans? Which lender legally has the right to bring a foreclosure lawsuit?

It’s not about owing the money: there’s a loan on a home so yes, somebody has to pay and a lender has to receive the money. But you want to make sure that you’re paying the right person.

What would you do as a homeowner if somebody shows up with a check and says, “here you wrote this check, two months ago, three years ago, so I’m going to cash it.” It’s not the original lender you paid. It’s a new entity you’ve never heard of, were never introduced to or sent documentation by to say the loan was sold and that you will now pay Lender No. 2, or No. 6, or No. 15.

Without an audit, proof that they own the note with all signatures placed in the proper place, you can’t be sure which lender or bank really has the right to cash your monthly mortgage payment check.

Your Right as a Homeowner: Ask, Demand Proof 

Homeowners have the right in foreclosure to know who they’re dealing with and who owns their promissory note. The only way to make sure that if you pay the bank, that they’re the bank that you’re supposed to pay is through an audit.

Because if you believe that somebody else isn’t going to show up in the future and say, “well, gosh Mrs. Homeowner, I really am sorry but you paid the wrong party. Oops, our mistake.”

In actuality the lender doesn’t care if you paid that other lender because but the reality is that you owe another lender. Now. So, pay up. And if you don’t pay us, a foreclosure lawsuit will be filed against you.

The very first question to be asked in any kind of case where the defendant says, “well prove it;” bring the evidence that shows who is supposed to be paid. When the proof is provided and if the proof is provided, a homeowner must pay. But until then, the question that remains and which has to be proven by the banks in foreclosure lawsuits is that they own the note on the home and that they have the paperwork to prove it.

This is why the June 2013 Florida foreclosure law slowed down so many foreclosure lawsuits. Banks have switched, bought and sold so many mortgages that the paperwork, legitimate signatures, staff etc. have not been able to be provided.

The bad, illegal signatures have been caught on occasion. Others have not because homeowners haven’t had the attorney to take the bank to task and prove ownership of the note.

This is why the rules of evidence experience held by a foreclosure lawyer is imperative. Being able to wade through and sort through every page of a mortgage knowing what to look for and what an illegal signature, process, timeframe, stamp or other documentation looks like is what will determine whether a foreclosure case is won or lost.

Consult with Eric Lanigan and Roddy Lanigan on a foreclosure lawsuit to have a forensic audit or securitization audit performed. You’ll uncover whether you’ve paid the correct bank, the wrong lender or if your note has been lost, where it may have disappeared to in the chaotic record keeping by banks.

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