Last summer GMAC, one of the nation’s largest mortgage providers, had a property it wanted to foreclose, but they lacked the proper paperwork, according to ProPublica.
The loan originator was Ameriquest, who granted subprime loans, but the company went under in 2007. GMAC began looking into the way it could foreclose on the homeowner in 2008, but couldn’t come up with a solution other than creating fraudulent documents.
In July of 2010, GMAC filed documents with New York authorities to initiate foreclosure on the property. According to their paperwork, they took over the Ameriquest loan in 2005, but the seizure documents were dated in 2010, three years after the company ceased to exist.
Foreclosure defense attorney, Thomas Cox, told ProPublica, “This assignment of mortgage has all the markings of GMAC finding that it lacked a needed mortgage assignment in order to foreclose and just making it up.”
GMAC used one person to robo-sign foreclosure documents since the market collapse and are still pursuing foreclosures signed by this employee.
Out of the 4,000 foreclosure proceedings that GMAC had initiated, only 4 percent have retained foreclosure lawyers to contest the seizure. GMAC has changed their name to Ally Financial in order to distance them from the robo-signing scandal.
Even though a large majority of homeowners aren’t facing wrongful foreclosures, there are some issues with the banks’ shoddy paperwork. A foreclosure attorney will be able to determine if a homeowner has a legal recourse to contest the bank’s decision.
