Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

Foreclosure Fraud

Mr.S working under a LLC loans money to Mr.M who signs over to the LLC Trust Deeds on 2 properties,his home and his mother's home. A mortgage company forecloses on the properties a short time later and the LLC buys the properties in foreclosure. The LLC bought one property for $75,000 and sold it 4 days later for $600,000. The LLC bought the other property for $100,000 and sold it 4 months later for $800,000.

Is it legal for a lender to sign a loan over to a mortgage company who forecloses on a property and the lender then buys the property way below market value and immediately sells it for a large profit?

Also borrower's wife never received notice of default or notices regarding the foreclosure and sale of the house she was living in at the time. Is this legal? What recourse does she have?


Asked on 11/09/06, 10:00 am

1 Answer from Attorneys

Judith Deming Deming & Associates

Re: Foreclosure Fraud

I'm not sure there is anything wrong here. When the holder of a security interest in property (the lender) goes unpaid, he requests that a trustee start foreclosure as a result of non-payment--it is a process that takes about 4 months, and the lender (or his trustee--usually a separate company) need only send the notices of default to the address of the borrower, and it is also recorded with the county recorder, and this constitutes legal notice to EVERYONE; at the time of the foreclosure sale, the "opening bid" is the unpaid amount owed to the lender; if no one bids on the property, it is "sold" back to the lender for the amount of the unpaid debt. All the borrower ever had to do was to bring the payments current and stop the sale. After a foreclosure by trustee's sale, the foreclosing lender owns the property and can sell it for whatever he wants, and there is no impropriety in so doing. The borrower's wife has a duty to make sure that payments are being made on property she is residing in--if she did not do so, that is her fault.

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Answered on 11/09/06, 4:41 pm


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