Foreclosure Crisis: Scams On The Rise In Florida

September 17th, 2007

Florida’s advocates are besieged with victims of foreclosure scams. The legal fraternity is turning to the Advocate General Bill McCollum for succour. An organization dealing with legal aid in Broward County is asking for emergency measures to be taken. Legal Aid Service has suggested that plans should be set afoot following the line of approach taken by Massachusetts’s Attorney General, Martha Coakley in June this year. According to the Massachusetts plan, foreclosure for the sake of profit has been declared illegal. Foreclosed victims find themselves flooded with help messages from dubious persons and organizations after the bank notifies foreclosure following which their details are published in court papers.
Coakley had taken the authority firmly in her hands within the framework of the existing laws and clamped down on scams. The Boward lawyers want similar swift action. McCollum has the right to do so under the provisions of Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Law of Florida. The governor through an executive order can implement it. Simultaneously the organization expects changes to be brought about by Florida legislators.
George Castrataro an attorney of the aforesaid group says that they have always relied on the Attorney General to save them at critical times with temporary emergency measure until proper laws are set into motion. The strong hope is that the Attorney General will positively respond to the SOS. But on Wednesday the spokesperson of the AG was vague and said that the matter was being taken into serious consideration.
Currently the AG office is scrutinizing two such instances of scam in South Florida – National Foreclosure Management and American Home Rescue.
The fraud consists of stripping the equity by making false promises to the traumatized borrowers and charging exorbitant fees. The house owners are in such a psychological state that they are in no condition to understand the bitter-coated sweet pill they have swallowed until it is too late. The scam is of special significance now because the real estate boom had led to a build up on the equity but now the balloon has been pricked with the lenders nearly doubling their asking rates.
The National Consumer Law Center in Washington is coaxing McCollum to go ahead with the assurance that the federal government will soon follow suit. Scammers must be totally banned and not merely allowed to change their colours like a chameleon.