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The Big Lie: MERS Mortgages in Massachusetts by Jamie Ranney, Esq.

The Big Lie: MERS Mortgages in Massachusetts by Jamie Ranney, Esq.


This is a repost from a previous post dated 11/30/2010

by Jamie Ranney, Esq.
Jamie Ranney, PC
4 Thirty Acres Lane
Nantucket, MA 02554
jamie@nantucketlaw.pro
508-228-9224

This memo will focus on MERS-designated mortgages in Massachusetts.

In this author’s opinion two (2) things are evident after a survey of Massachusetts law.

First, MERS cannot be a valid “mortgagee” under Massachusetts law and thus MERS designated mortgages are invalid in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

This is because MERS-designated mortgages by definition “split” the security instrument (the mortgage) from the debt (the promissory note) when they are signed. This “split” invalidates the mortgage under Massachusetts law. Where the security interest is invalid upon the signing of the mortgage, MERS cannot occupy the legal position of a “mortgagee” under Massachusetts law no matter what language MERS inserts into their mortgages that purports to give them the legal position of “mortgagee”. Since MERS-designated mortgages are invalid at their inception, it follows logically therefore that MERS mortgages are not legally capable of being recorded in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts by its Registers of Deeds.

Second, even if a MERS-designated mortgage were found to be a valid security instrument in Massachusetts, each and every assignment of the mortgage and note “behind” a MERS-designated mortgage must be recorded on the public land records of the Commonwealth in order to comply with the Massachusetts recording statute at M.G.L. c. 183, s. 4 which requires that “conveyances of an estate” be recorded to be valid. A mortgage is a “conveyance of an estate” under Massachusetts law. Since MERS-designated mortgages exist for the primary purpose of holding “legal” title on the public land records while the “beneficial” interest is transferred and sold multiple times (and a mortgage cannot exist without a note under Massachusetts law), MERS-mortgages unlawfully avoid recording fees due the Commonwealth for the transfer(s) of interests under MERS-designated mortgages.

“If you tell a lie that’s big enough, and you tell it often enough, people will believe you are telling the truth, even when what you are saying is total crap.”1

Continue reading below…

[ipaper docId=44370743 access_key=key-1en9gd3bwhh0zs2atypk height=600 width=600 /]

© 2010-19 FORECLOSURE FRAUD | by DinSFLA. All rights reserved.



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John O’Brien, Southern Essex District Register of Deeds in Salem, Massachusetts extends an invitation to banks and all attorney generals to visit his registry.

John O’Brien, Southern Essex District Register of Deeds in Salem, Massachusetts extends an invitation to banks and all attorney generals to visit his registry.


Commonwealth of Massachusetts

Southern Essex District Registry of Deeds
Shetland Park
45 Congress Street
Suite 4100
Salem, Massachusetts 01970

NEWS

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Salem, MA
August 30, 2011
Contact:
John O’Brien, Register of Deeds
978-542-1722
jl.obrien@sec.state.ma.us

.

John O’Brien, Southern Essex District Register of Deeds in Salem, Massachusetts extends an invitation to banks and all attorney generals to visit his registry.

O’Brien who has been leading the national effort to hold lenders accountable and was the first in the nation to refuse to record robo-signed documents, has invited the CEO’s of the nation’s largest banks including Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo along with the 50 states’ attorneys general to come to the Salem Registry and view first-hand the damage that these banks and the Mortgage Electronic Registration System (MERS) has caused to thousands of Essex County homeowners’ chains of title.

“It’s as if a hurricane came through here,” said Register John O’Brien, referring to the financial havoc and damage done to property records at the Registry of Deeds.

“Following any disaster, the powers-that-be generally visit the scene to assess the damage. That is what I would like these major lenders and the attorneys general to do – a visit to my registry sooner rather than later, may help these lenders to truly appreciate the extent of the damage” O’Brien said.

O’Brien believes that a sweetheart deal, in the form of a settlement to grant lenders immunity from prosecution, is in the works. O’Brien stated, “There can be no settlement granting the lenders immunity and at the same time letting MERS of the hook”. “I believe the responsible thing to do would be to see the damage before they talk settlement. They owe the American people that. If they are truly sincere about cleaning up this mess then they should take me up on my offer”.

The settlement currently in negotiations with the banks is being led by Tom Miller, the Iowa Attorney General who just last week removed New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, a vocal critic of the proposed settlement. O’Brien has expressed his outrage over the ouster and has called for Miller to step aside. O’Brien said “we need more Eric Schneidermans fighting the fight. He is the voice of Main Street not Wall Street”. According to O’Brien, any settlement at this time would be a total sellout of the American property owner and their property rights.

We still do not know the extent of the damage and just how much they have fleeced from taxpayers in lost recording fees, which in my opinion run into billions of dollars.

These CEO’s have to step up and take full responsibility for what they have allowed to happen. They have played fast and loose with people’s property rights, and have corrupted the chains of title to hundreds of thousands of property owners across this country,” O’Brien says.

In addition, O’Brien believes that the only way lenders and the attorneys general can fully appreciate the ramifications of the schemes (including the recording of fraudulent documents, which in some cases were used to take people’s homes illegally; the use of robo-signers; and the failure to record assignments) is to travel to Salem, sit across the table from him and review the documents. Only then, will they fully understand the extent of the damage that’s been caused.

“Hopefully,” O’Brien says, “By viewing the thousands of fraudulent documents recorded in my Registry, they will begin to understand how serious this issue is and work with Registers of Deeds across this country to correct the wrongs that have been committed.”

“All I am looking for is justice for these homeowners. I have said all along, that the banks need to talk to Registers of Deeds. What better way, than to come to an actual Registry and see first-hand what I am talking about. It would be the responsible thing for them to do. We would be able to have an open and frank discussion which hopefully would lead to a solution. The last thing the American people need now is to have this issue swept under the rug and settled for pennies on the dollar,” O’Brien said.

© 2010-19 FORECLOSURE FRAUD | by DinSFLA. All rights reserved.



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John O’Brien MA Registry of Deeds: AG Tom Miller Should Step Down

John O’Brien MA Registry of Deeds: AG Tom Miller Should Step Down


Richard Zombeck-

John O’Brien, Registry of Deeds for Southern Essex County in Massachusetts is asking that Tom Miller, Iowa Attorney General, step down. Miller is the lead AG in the controversial settlement with the big banks on mortgage servicing fraud.

In his most recent obscene act Miller kicked Attorney General Eric Schneiderman off of the 50-state task force probing foreclosure abuses and negotiating a possible settlement agreement with the mortgage firms.

[HUFFINGTON POST]

© 2010-19 FORECLOSURE FRAUD | by DinSFLA. All rights reserved.



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Lawmakers call for hearings on robo-signing

Lawmakers call for hearings on robo-signing


By MICHELLE CONLIN, AP Business Writers –

NEW YORK (AP) — Lawmakers and enforcement agencies called for hearings and further investigation Tuesday after learning that the illegal practice known as robo-signing has continued in the mortgage industry.

The Associated Press reported on Monday that county officials in at least three states — Massachusetts, North Carolina and Michigan — say they have received thousands of mortgage documents with questionable signatures since last fall. That’s when forged signatures and false affidavits — also called robo-signing — led to a temporary halt to foreclosures. Banks and mortgage processers promised to stop the practice. But the findings of the county officials indicate that robo-signing is still a widespread problem.

Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio., chair of the Financial Institutions and Consumer Protection Subcommittee, said the subcommittee will hold a hearing on the robo-signing issue.

“Wall Street and some in Washington want us to believe that robo-signing is a thing of the past,” said Brown. “But the same risky practices that put our economy on the brink of collapse continue to infect the housing market.”

Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., a senior member of the House Committee on Financial Services said the lenders who continue the practice “need to be investigated and prosecuted.” She told The Associated Press that she believed regulators should step in and that the absence of stronger regulation is “the reason why the system broke down in the first place.” She said the county officials’ findings show lenders will not stop practices like robo-signing on their own.

“(The lenders) have complete disregard for the damage they have already caused and have no intention of changing their ways,” said Waters, who also called for more hearings on the issue.

County officials who are responsible for keeping land records, including property deeds, say that they have received thousands of robo-signed documents filed in their offices since October.

In Essex County, Mass., the office that handles property deeds has received almost 1,300 documents since October with the signature of “Linda Green,” but in 22 different handwriting styles and with many different titles.

In Guilford County, N.C., the office that records deeds says it received 456 documents with suspect signatures from Oct. 1, 2010, through June 30. And in Michigan, a fraud investigator who works on behalf of homeowners says he has uncovered documents filed this year bearing the purported signature of Marshall Isaacs, an attorney with foreclosure law firm Orlans Associates.

Early Tuesday, an official from the office of Minnesota attorney general, Lori Swanson, contacted the Essex County’s John O’Brien to get more information for its own investigation into robo-signing. The Massachusetts attorney general’s office also confirmed that it is meeting with several of the state’s 21 registers of deeds to assess the extent of robo-signing in the state.

Also on Tuesday, nine recorders of deeds in Illinois held a press conference to say they will assist the state’s attorney general Lisa Madigan who is investigating robo-signing in her state.

Rep. Waters, meanwhile, says the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, or the OCC, is the main federal regulator for banks. As such, it’s the OCC’s responsibility to investigate the banks.

The OCC has been criticized by lawmakers and consumer advocates for going easy on banks in the past. The same criticism has resurfaced since the robo-signing scandal broke in September. Last fall, The Associated Press found that robo-signed documents led to banks wrongfully foreclosing on people who had paid their mortgages in full. When asked about the issue, an OCC spokesman flatly denied that any such thing had ever occurred.

The OCC partnered with other federal regulators and conducted a review of bank procedures including robo-signing in December. In April, the 14 largest national banks entered into a consent decree with the OCC in which they vowed to submit action plans as to how they would address such systemic issues as robo-signing.

Last week, the banks delivered those action plans to the OCC, which is now reviewing them, a spokesman said.

© 2010-19 FORECLOSURE FRAUD | by DinSFLA. All rights reserved.



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AP Exclusive: Mortgage ‘robo-signing’ goes on

AP Exclusive: Mortgage ‘robo-signing’ goes on


By MICHELLE CONLIN, AP Business Writers –

Mortgage industry employees are still signing documents they haven’t read and using fake signatures more than eight months after big banks and mortgage companies promised to stop the illegal practices that led to a nationwide halt of home foreclosures.

County officials in at least three states say they have received thousands of mortgage documents with questionable signatures since last fall, suggesting that the practices, known collectively as “robo-signing,” remain widespread in the industry.

The documents have come from several companies that process mortgage paperwork, and have been filed on behalf of several major banks. One name, “Linda Green,” was signed almost two dozen different ways.

Lenders say they are working with regulators to fix the problem but cannot explain why it has persisted.

Last fall, the nation’s largest banks and mortgage lenders, including JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Bank of America and an arm of Goldman Sachs, suspended foreclosures while they investigated how corners were cut to keep pace with the crush of foreclosure paperwork.

Critics say the new findings point to a systemic problem with the paperwork involved in home mortgages and titles. And they say it shows that banks and mortgage processors haven’t acted aggressively enough to put an end to widespread document fraud in the mortgage industry.

“Robo-signing is not even close to over,” says Curtis Hertel, the recorder of deeds in Ingham County, Mich., which includes Lansing. “It’s still an epidemic.”

In Essex County, Mass., the office that handles property deeds has received almost 1,300 documents since October with the signature of “Linda Green,” but in 22 different handwriting styles and with many different titles.

Linda Green worked for a company called DocX that processed mortgage paperwork and was shut down in the spring of 2010. County officials say they believe Green hasn’t worked in the industry since. Why her signature remains in use is not clear.

“My office is a crime scene,” says John O’Brien, the registrar of deeds in Essex County, which is north of Boston and includes the city of Salem.

In Guilford County, N.C., the office that records deeds says it received 456 documents with suspect signatures from Oct. 1, 2010, through June 30. The documents, mortgage assignments and certificates of satisfaction, transfer loans from one bank to another or certify a loan has been paid off.

Suspect signatures on the paperwork include 290 signed by Bryan Bly and 155 by Crystal Moore. In the mortgage investigations last fall, both admitted signing their names to mortgage documents without having read them. Neither was charged with a crime.

And in Michigan, a fraud investigator who works on behalf of homeowners says he has uncovered documents filed this year bearing the purported signature of Marshall Isaacs, an attorney with foreclosure law firm Orlans Associates. Isaacs’ name did not come up in last year’s investigations, but county officials across Michigan believe his name is being robo-signed.

O’Brien caused a stir in June at a national convention of county clerks by presenting his findings and encouraging his counterparts to investigate continued robo-signing.

The nation’s foreclosure machine almost came to a standstill when the nation’s largest banks suspended foreclosures last fall. Part of the problem, banks contended, was that foreclosures became so rampant in 2009 and 2010 that they were overwhelmed with paperwork.

The banks reviewed thousands of foreclosure filings, and where they found problems, they submitted new paperwork to courts handling the cases, with signatures they said were valid. The banks slowly started to resume foreclosures this winter and spring.

The 14 biggest U.S. banks reached a settlement with federal regulators in April in which they promised to clean up their mistakes and pay restitution to homeowners who had been wrongly foreclosed upon. The full amount of the settlement has not been determined. But it will not involve independent mortgage processing firms, the companies that some banks use to handle and file paperwork for mortgages.

So far, no individuals, lenders or paperwork processors have been charged with a crime over the robo-signed signatures found on documents last year. Critics such as April Charney, a Florida homeowner and defense lawyer, called the settlement a farce because no real punishment was meted out, making it easy for lenders and mortgage processors to continue the practice of robo-signing.

Robo-signing refers to a variety of practices. It can mean a qualified executive in the mortgage industry signs a mortgage affidavit document without verifying the information. It can mean someone forges an executive’s signature, or a lower-level employee signs his or her own name with a fake title. It can mean failing to comply with notary procedures. In all of these cases, robo-signing involves people signing documents and swearing to their accuracy without verifying any of the information.

Most of the tainted mortgage documents in question last fall were related to homes in foreclosure. But much of the suspect paperwork that has been filed since then is for refinancing or for new purchases by people who are in good standing in the eyes of the bank. In addition, foreclosures are down 30 percent this year from last. Home sales have also fallen. So the new suspect documents come at a time when much less paperwork is streaming through the nation’s mortgage machinery.

None of the almost 1,300 suspect Linda Green-signed documents from O’Brien’s office, for example, involve foreclosures. And Jeff Thigpen, the register of deeds in North Carolina’s Guilford County, says fewer than 40 of the 456 suspect documents filed to his office since October involved foreclosures.

Banks and their partner firms file mortgage documents with county deeds offices to prove that there are no liens on a property, that the bank owns a mortgage or that a bank filing for foreclosure has the authority to do so.

The signature of a qualified bank or mortgage official on these legal documents is supposed to guarantee that this information is accurate. The paper trail ensures a legal chain of title on a property and has been the backbone of U.S. property ownership for more than 300 years.

The county officials say the problem could be even worse than what they’re reporting. That’s because they are working off lists of known robo-signed names, such as Linda Green and Crystal Moore, that were identified during the investigation that began last fall. Officials suspect that other names on documents they have received since then are also robo-signed.

It is a federal crime to sign someone else’s name to a legal document. It is also illegal to sign your name to an affidavit if you have not verified the information you’re swearing to. Both are punishable by prison.

In Michigan, the attorney general took the rare step in June of filing criminal subpoenas to out-of-state mortgage processing companies after 23 county registers of deeds filed a criminal complaint with his office over robo-signed documents they say they have received. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s office has said it is conducting a banking probe that could lead to criminal charges against financial executives. The attorneys general of Delaware, California and Illinois are conducting their own probes.

The legal issues are grave, deeds officials across the country say. At worst, legal experts say, the document debacle has opened the property system to legal liability well beyond the nation’s foreclosure crisis. So someone buying a home and trying to obtain title insurance might be delayed or denied if robo-signed documents turn up in the property’s history. That’s because forged signatures call into question who owns mortgages and the properties they are attached to.

“The banks have completely screwed up property records,” says L. Randall Wray, an economics professor and senior scholar at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

In the Massachusetts case, The Associated Press tried to reach Linda Green, whose name was purportedly signed 1,300 times since October. The AP, using a phone number provided by lawyers who have been investigating the documents since last year, reached a person who said she was Linda Green, but not the Linda Green involved in the mortgage investigation.

In the Michigan case, a lawyer for the Orlans Associates law firm, where Isaacs works, denies that Isaacs or the firm has done anything wrong. “People have signatures that change,” says Terry Cramer, general counsel for the firm. “We do not engage in ‘robo-signing’ at Orlans.”

To combat the stream of suspect filings, O’Brien and Jeff Thigpen, the register of deeds in North Carolina’s Guilford County, stopped accepting questionable paperwork June 7. They say they had no choice after complaining to federal and state authorities for months without getting anywhere.

Since then, O’Brien has received nine documents from Bank of America purportedly signed by Linda Burton, another name on authorities’ list of known robo-signers. For years, his office has regularly received documents signed with Burton’s name but written in such vastly different handwriting that two forensic investigators say it’s highly unlikely it all came from the same person.

O’Brien returned the nine Burton documents to Bank of America in mid-June. He told the bank he would not file them unless the bank signed an affidavit certifying the signature and accepting responsibility if the title was called into question down the road. Instead, Bank of America sent new documents with new signatures and new notaries.

A Bank of America spokesman says Burton is an assistant vice president with a subsidiary, ReconTrust. That company handles mortgage paperwork processing for Bank of America.

“She signed the documents on behalf of the bank,” spokesman Richard Simon says. The bank says providing the affidavit O’Brien asked for would have been costly and time-consuming. Instead, Simon says Bank of America sent a new set of documents “signed by an authorized associate who Mr. O’Brien wasn’t challenging.”

The bank didn’t respond to questions about why Burton’s name has been signed in different ways or why her signature appeared on documents that investigators in at least two states have deemed invalid.

Several attempts by the AP to reach Burton at ReconTrust were unsuccessful.

O’Brien says the bank’s actions show “consciousness of guilt.” Earlier this year, he hired Marie McDonnell, a mortgage fraud investigator and forensic document analyst, to verify his suspicions about Burton’s and other names on suspect paperwork.

She compared valid copies of Burton’s signature with the documents O’Brien had received in 2008, 2009 and 2010 and found that Burton’s name was fraudulently signed on hundreds of documents.

Most of the documents reviewed by McDonnell were mortgage discharges, which are issued when a home changes hands or is refinanced by a new lender and are supposed to confirm that the previous mortgage has been paid off. Bank of America declined comment on McDonnell’s findings.

In Michigan, recorder of deeds Hertel and his counterparts in 23 other counties found numerous suspect signatures on documents filed since the beginning of the year.

In June, their findings led the Michigan attorney general to issue criminal subpoenas to several firms that process mortgages for banks, including Lender Processing Services, the parent company of DocX, where Linda Green worked. On July 6, the CEO of that company, which is also under investigation by the Florida Attorney General’s office, resigned, citing health reasons.

© 2010-19 FORECLOSURE FRAUD | by DinSFLA. All rights reserved.



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Southern Essex Registry of Deeds Audit Reveals That 75% of Assignments of Mortgage Are Invalid

Southern Essex Registry of Deeds Audit Reveals That 75% of Assignments of Mortgage Are Invalid


 

Commonwealth of Massachusetts

Southern Essex District Registry of Deeds
Shetland Park
45 Congress Street
Suite 4100
Salem, Massachusetts 01970

JOHN L. O’BRIEN, JR.
Register of Deeds
Phone:
978-542-1704
Fax:
978-542-1706
website:
www.salemdeeds.com

 

NEWS FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Salem, MA
June 29th, 2011

Contact:
Kevin Harvey, 1st Assistant Register
978-542-1724
kevin.harvey@sec.state.ma.us

 

Marie McDonnell, President, McDonnell Property Analytics, Inc.
508-694-6866
marie@mcdonnellanalytics.com

Southern Essex Registry of Deeds Audit Reveals That 75% of Assignments of Mortgage Are Invalid; O’Brien Says Banks Responsible for an Epidemic of Fraud.  Once again urges Attorney’s General to stop Bank settlement talks.

 

Yesterday at the Annual Conference of The International Association of Clerks, Recorders, Election Officials and Treasurers (IACREOT), Register John O’Brien revealed the results of an independent audit of his registry.  The audit, which is released as a legal affidavit was performed by McDonnell Property Analytics, examined assignments of mortgage recorded in the Essex Southern District Registry of Deeds issued to and from JPMorgan Chase Bank, Wells Fargo Bank, and Bank of America during 2010.  In total, 565 assignments related to 473 unique mortgages were analyzed.

McDonnell’s Report includes the following key findings:

–          Only 16% of assignments of mortgage are valid

–          75% of assignments of mortgage are invalid.

–          9% of assignments of mortgage are questionable

–          27% of the invalid assignments are fraudulent, 35% are “robo-signed” and 10% violate the Massachusetts Mortgage Fraud Statute.

–          The identity of financial institutions that are current owners of the mortgages could only be determined for 287 out of 473 (60%)

–          There are 683 missing assignments for the 287 traced mortgages, representing approximately $180,000 in lost recording fees per 1,000 mortgages whose current ownership can be traced.

McDonnell told O’Brien, “I have been auditing residential mortgage loans for the past twenty years on a one-by-one basis.  In the process, I have been cataloging the ramp up in predatory lending and mortgage fraud for all of those years, but I was not prepared for the shocking results of my audit.  What this means is that the degradation in standards of commerce by which the banks originated, sold and securitized these mortgages are so fatally flawed that the institutions, including many pension funds, that purchased these mortgages don’t actually own them because the assignments of mortgage were never prepared, executed and delivered to them in the normal course of business at the time of the transaction.  In a blatant attempt to engineer a ‘fix’ to the problem, the banks set up in-house document execution teams, or outsourced the preparation of their assignments to third parties who manufactured them out of thin air without researching who really owns the mortgage.”

O’Brien asked McDonnell what this means for his constituents.  “It is vitally important for your constituents to know that if they are in foreclosure now or if their homes have been foreclosed upon, they can stop the foreclosure from proceeding, or institute a court action to vacate a completed foreclosure. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has established the law of the land in its decisions U.S. Bank, N.A. v. Ibanez and Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. v. LaRace and I can tell you that every single assignment of mortgage that was recorded for the purpose of foreclosing the homeowner is invalid, overtly fraudulent, or criminally fraudulent. My findings also show that your constituents who are not in foreclosure, and have never been delinquent in their payments also have clouds on title due to the recording of defective and invalid discharges and assignments of mortgage.”

“My registry is a crime scene as evidenced by this forensic examination,” stated John O’Brien. “This crime that has affected thousands of homeowners in Essex County who, through no fault of their own, have had their property rights trampled on and their chain of title compromised. This evidence has made it clear to me that the only way we can ever determine the total economic loss and the amount damage done to the taxpayers is by conducting a full forensic audit of all registry of deeds in Massachusetts. I suspect that at the end of the day we are going to find that the taxpayers have been bilked in this state alone of over 400 million dollars not including the accrued interest plus costs and penalties. The Audit makes the finding that this was not only a MERS problem, but a scheme also perpetuated by MERS shareholder banks such Bank of America, Wells Fargo, JP Morgan and others. I am stunned and appalled by the fact that America’s biggest banks have played fast and loose with people’s biggest asset – their homes.  This is disgusting, and this is criminal,” said O’Brien.

O’Brien continued “Once again I am asking Attorney General Martha Coakley and the other state Attorney’s General to follow the lead of New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and stop any settlement talks with the banks. The results of this report are only for my registry, but I can assure you that this type of criminal fraud is rampant across the nation. This leaves me to question why anyone would consider settling with these banks until we know the full extent of the damage that they have caused to the homeowners chain of title across this country and the amount of money they have bilked the taxpayers for their failure to pay recording fees.”

 

The Full Report is included with this release and may also be requested at www.mcdonnellanalytics.com.

This report was published with Marie McDonnell’s permission. Please note: This hard work was done on a pro bono basis and Marie’s contribution to you all.

Please email Marie and say thank you!

[ipaper docId=59025852 access_key=key-1ksks6h3wr1p6u5dkrzb height=600 width=600 /]

© 2010-19 FORECLOSURE FRAUD | by DinSFLA. All rights reserved.



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BREAKING: Sarah Palin, Your New AZ Home Robo-Signed… Again, Meet Deborah Brignac

BREAKING: Sarah Palin, Your New AZ Home Robo-Signed… Again, Meet Deborah Brignac


Commonwealth of Massachusetts
Southern Essex District Registry of Deeds
Shetland Park
45 Congress Street
Suite 4100
Salem, Massachusetts 01970

JOHN L. O’BRIEN, JR.
Register of Deeds
Phone: 978-542-1704
Fax: 978-542-1706
website: www.salemdeeds.com

NEWS
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Salem, MA
June 9th, 2011

Contact:
Kevin Harvey, 1st Assistant Register
978-542-1724
kevin.harvey@sec.state.ma.us

Marie McDonnell, President McDonnell Property Analytics, Inc.
508-694-6866
marie@mcdonnellanalytics.com

Massachusetts Register of Deeds John O’Brien and Forensic Mortgage Fraud Examiner Marie McDonnell find former Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin is victim of potential mortgage fraud; expert says chain of title to new Arizona home clouded by robo-signers.

In what is an ironic twist of fate today Register of Deeds John O’Brien and nationally renowned mortgage fraud examiner Marie McDonnell, President of McDonnell Property Analytics, Inc., announce that former Alaska Governor and Vice-Presidential nominee Sarah Palin is an unwitting victim of mortgage fraud and has purchased a home in Arizona that contains flaws in the chain of title.

Register O’Brien said, “If fundamental property principles still matter in this country, Sarah Palin may have legal issues that could affect the ownership of her home. Through no fault of her own, Sarah Palin has become a victim like thousands of others across the country that have the same problem with their chain of title. I feel bad for Governor Palin and all the homeowners who have been victimized by this scheme, it just goes to show you that no one is immune from this type of fraud and irresponsible behavior that these banks participated in.”

Marie McDonnell added, “Sarah Palin’s chain of title has been swept up into the eye of the ‘perfect storm’ where robo-signer Linda Green’s fraudulent Deed of Release on behalf of Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. is eclipsed by robo-signer Deborah Brignac’s fraudulent foreclosure documents. Brignac, a Vice President of California Reconveyance Company (a subsidiary of JPMorgan Chase Bank), assigned the homeowner’s Deed of Trust to JPMorgan Chase Bank in her capacity as a Vice President of Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc. (“MERS”); in the same breath, Brignac executed a document appointing California Reconveyance Company (her real employer) as Substitute Trustee in her alleged capacity as a Vice President of JPMorgan Chase.”

Sound confusing? McDonnell explained, “This is a shell game where Brignac purports to be Vice President of three (3) different entities so that she can manufacture the paperwork necessary for JPMorgan Chase Bank to hijack the mortgage and then foreclose on the property. This is an excellent example of how MERS is being used by its Members to perpetrate a fraud. I have laid out a timeline that illustrates the defects in Sara Palin’s chain of title which shows that it is seriously, if not fatally impaired.” McDonnell whose firm performed the extensive forensic analysis. (See McDonnell’s Mortgage Map)

O’Brien, who recently announced that he found 6047 fraudulent Linda Green documents recorded in the Essex Southern District Registry of Deeds which had 22 different variations of a Linda Green signature has been the National Leader in blowing the whistle on banks such as Bank of America, J.P. Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo for their business practices. O’Brien said “These banks have participated in a national epidemic of fraud that has clouded or damaged the chain of title of hundreds of thousands of American homeowners all across the country”. O’Brien further said “Sadly, Sarah Palin’s misfortune will however, hopefully shine the national spotlight on this issue. Given her position in the country, I am sure that she will use her influence to stand up for homeowners and their property rights”.

[Click image below to see McDonnell’s Palin Mortgage Map]


[ipaper docId=57497718 access_key=key-1w7fb7ufnsa0wsp7b4bl height=600 width=600 /]

[Sarah Image: VARIGHT.com]

© 2010-19 FORECLOSURE FRAUD | by DinSFLA. All rights reserved.



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An Open Letter to Jeff Thigpen, Guilford County, NC Register of Deeds and John O’Brien, Southern Essex County, Massachusetts Register of Deeds

An Open Letter to Jeff Thigpen, Guilford County, NC Register of Deeds and John O’Brien, Southern Essex County, Massachusetts Register of Deeds


Mortgage Fraud

Lender Processing Services/DocX

Action Date: June 8, 2011
Location: Guilford County, NC

An Open Letter to Jeff Thigpen, Guilford County, NC Register of Deeds and John O’Brien, Southern Essex County, Massachusetts Register of Deeds

Dear Jeff and John,

I want to remind you exactly who you stood up for yesterday. I get emails – hundreds each week – from sick, unemployed, elderly people, young families and veterans who are frightened, too broke to afford a lawyer, and being foreclosed by banks that are using badly forged documents to claim their homes.

This week, judges across the country will grant foreclosures – based on mortgage assignments signed by Linda Green, Korell Harp, Tywanna Thomas and others like them who were following orders from the banks.

A Miami judge said to me “I know who you are – you’re that woman who thinks she can stop a foreclosure because the notary signed her name upside-down.”

The hostility in the courtrooms is really amazing. I expect I will get thrown in jail in Miami some day for contempt for even suggesting a bank committed fraud.

Most days, it is my ragtag, never-say-die colleagues in foreclosure (wonderful people) and some non-bank-owned journalists who are willing to speak the truth about the bank documents used to steal homes.

You two were the first two public officials in the country who were willing to do more than “investigate” – who actually took action.

You will never know how much your act gave me encouragement when I needed it most.

Thank you from me, and on behalf of thousands of people across the country who doubted any public official would ever stand up, speak the truth and take action.

With admiration,

Lynn Szymoniak

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Posted in STOP FORECLOSURE FRAUDComments (3)

READ | Essex County, MA John O’Brien Rejection Letter & Affidavit re: M.G.L. c. 266 § 35A

READ | Essex County, MA John O’Brien Rejection Letter & Affidavit re: M.G.L. c. 266 § 35A


Highlight of these incredible documents:

MGL Chapter 266, Section 35A (b) (4) provides that:

“Whoever intentionally: files or causes to be filed with a registrar of deeds any document that contains a material statement that is false or a material omission, knowing such document to contain a material statement that is false or a material omission, shall be punished by imprisonment in the state prison for not more than 5 years or by imprisonment in the house of correction for not more than 2 and one-half years or by a fine of not more than $10,000 in the case of a natural person or not more than $100,000 in the case of any other person, or by both such fine and imprisonment.”

Once the Affidavit is prepared and notarized, please forward it and your Recording to my attention with a recording fee of $75 for each document, and I will make sure the documents are put on record forthwith.

[…]

[ipaper docId=57341453 access_key=key-d99wdhhax2y6o3lamab height=600 width=600 /]

© 2010-19 FORECLOSURE FRAUD | by DinSFLA. All rights reserved.



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[VIDEO] Essex County, MA Locates 6,000+ DOCx “Linda Green” Documents

[VIDEO] Essex County, MA Locates 6,000+ DOCx “Linda Green” Documents


If you’ve ever bought or sold a home…you need to hear this. Hank found a signature buried deep in your mortgage documents could be a ticking time bomb for thousands of Massachusetts homeowners. For those in foreclosure: it could be a lifesaver. It’s a shocking, amazing, unbelievable story. Hank Investigates.

http://www1.whdh.com/features/articles/hank/BO145706/

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MI Clerks Bullard, Hertel testify before House committee about fraudulent mortgage documents

MI Clerks Bullard, Hertel testify before House committee about fraudulent mortgage documents


LegalNews-

If someone does not pay their mortgage they will lose their home. But banks have to play by the rules, too.” Hertel further stated,


“We are looking at a massive fraud committed against the people of the state of Michigan.”


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[VIDEO] NBC Discusses MERS, Counties Seek Millions From Mortgage Giant

[VIDEO] NBC Discusses MERS, Counties Seek Millions From Mortgage Giant


MERS under fire for unpaid fees

By CHRIS GLORIOSO
Updated 7:08 AM EST, Tue, Mar 8, 2011

Most Americans have never heard of it, but this mortgage industry holds interests in 50 percent of all U.S. home loans.

No, not Fannie Mae, or Freddie Mac either.

Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, otherwise known as MERS, is a private firm that tracks ownership in hundreds of thousands of home loans.  The computerized network allows banks to buy and sell mortgages without having to record the transfers at the county level.

An added bonus for the banks is the avoidance of county fees.  When MERS is used to turn a regular mortgage into an investment, financial institutions don’t pay “recording fees,” which are usually small charges of between $50 and $100, to the counties where the underlying properties are physically located.

Full Article HERE

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MERS Responds to Essex Co., Mass. Announcement Company in compliance with purpose and intent of state recording acts

MERS Responds to Essex Co., Mass. Announcement Company in compliance with purpose and intent of state recording acts


MERS Responds to Essex Co., Mass. Announcement
Company in compliance with purpose and intent of
state recording acts

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Karmela Lejarde
703-761-1274

Reston, Virginia Feb. 25, 2011—MERS has not received any direct legal communication regarding Mr. O’Brien’s February 22, 2011 announcement. The use of MERS is in compliance with the purpose and intent of the state recording acts. MERS intends to fully defend itself against these unfounded allegations.

It is not the case that recording fees are somehow owed or outstanding. All MERS mortgages are recorded in the public land records, and MERS members pay recording fees when the mortgage is recorded. Fees are paid for a service performed, and if a document is eliminated because it is no longer necessary, no fee is due because there is nothing to record. We believe it is wrong and unethical to seek money for services that were never rendered, and in fact, MERS greatly reduces the workload of county recorders, resulting in lower operating expenses for the county recorder’s office. Moreover, it would be the borrower who ultimately pays the costs of recording assignments, either directly or indirectly.

When MERS is the mortgagee, the mortgage is recorded at the county land records, thereby putting the public on notice that there is a lien on the property. The MERS® System also complements the county land records by providing additional information that was never intended to be recorded at the county level, namely the information about the mortgage loan servicer, and now, with the addition of MERS® InvestorID, the name of the investor.

– 30 –

source: MERS

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O’BRIEN CALLS ON MERS TO COME CLEAN AND PAY UP: SAYS ESSEX COUNTY OWED $22 MILLION DOLLARS

O’BRIEN CALLS ON MERS TO COME CLEAN AND PAY UP: SAYS ESSEX COUNTY OWED $22 MILLION DOLLARS


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Salem, MA
February 22nd 2011

Contact:
Kevin Harvey, 1st Assistant Register
978-542-1724
kevin.harvey@sec.state.ma.us

O’BRIEN CALLS ON MERS TO COME CLEAN AND PAY UP: SAYS ESSEX COUNTY OWED $22 MILLION DOLLARS

Essex South Register of Deeds John O’Brien announced today that he will be seeking over $22 million dollars from the Mortgage Electronic Registration System, “MERS” which represents several major banking conglomerates.  O’Brien bases the $22M number on the fact that the Salem registry has recorded over 148,663 MERS mortgages since 1998.  After a careful review of a number of these mortgages O’Brien said it became very clear to him that MERS had assigned mortgages to other entities at least twice without paying a recording fee.  Based on this information the taxpayers have been defrauded out of $22,299,450 in Southern Essex County alone.  It is quite possible that in some cases they may have assigned the notes more than twice resulting in even greater loss of revenue. O’Brien called MERS “one of the greediest schemes ever perpetrated on the American people.  They have compromised the integrity of the public land recordation system and in doing so, have wreaked havoc on our economy”.

Last week MERS announced a major policy change conceding that assignments should be recorded in the various Registries across the country and “assignments out of MERS’s name should be recorded in the county land records, even if the state law does not require such a recording.” In addition MERS instructed its members to “not foreclose in MERS name”. O’Brien further states “MERS has now finally acknowledged that their business model was flawed, and they didn’t adhere to the legal requirement that all assignments of a mortgage must be recorded at the local Registry of Deeds.”  “If they had followed the law the public would know who was buying and selling their mortgage, and it would have been an open, honest and transparent process.  The fact that they deliberately chose to create a for-profit private cyber Registry of Deeds whose only purpose was to avoid paying the same fees as everyone else and keeping the public in the dark as to who was the rightful owner of the mortgage clearly demonstrates to me that this was a scheme of epic proportions.”  “When Wall Street and these major lenders joined together in creating MERS, they plunged us into a housing nightmare with little or no regard for their actions.  It’s obvious that their only motivation was to manufacture huge profits off the backs of homeowners and taxpayers. They should all be ashamed of themselves and step up to the plate and do the honorable thing and make the taxpayers’ whole,” O’Brien said.

The Essex South Registry of Deeds is one of 21 Registries in Massachusetts which have recorded MERS mortgages .O’Brien estimates that based on his conservative estimate of two assignments per mortgage the Commonwealth may be owed statewide upwards of $200 million dollars in lost recording fees.  Nationwide, the amount of revenue lost could be in the billions. O’Brien is calling on MERS to come clean and inform the registers of deeds across the country as to the number of times they assigned mortgages to other entities.  Only then will we get a true picture of the economic impact that this fraud has had on our country.

O’Brien, who in November, 2010, notified Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley about MERS, will now be forwarding to her this additional information. “We need to act quickly to recover these funds,” O’Brien said.

[ipaper docId=49355778 access_key=key-ov8013p1bz75wu9pdyi height=600 width=600 /]

© 2010-19 FORECLOSURE FRAUD | by DinSFLA. All rights reserved.



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John O’Brien, the Essex County register of deeds, isn’t buying it, and neither should you

John O’Brien, the Essex County register of deeds, isn’t buying it, and neither should you


Our View: Avoiding another mortgage mess

The Salem News Thu Dec 16, 2010, 06:00 AM EST

They did such a good job depressing the housing market and sending the economy into a tailspin, why not trust the banking cabal with keeping track of all property titles?

John O’Brien, the Essex County register of deeds, isn’t buying it, and neither should you.

O’Brien, of Lynn, is in the forefront of a national effort to challenge the policies and practices of the Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems Inc. (MERS). The agency was established in 1995 by a group of banking conglomerates including Bank of America, Countrywide Home Loans and Wells Fargo, to keep track of loans issued against property titles — a task previously performed by the public registries of deeds.

In a Nov. 18 letter to Attorney General Martha Coakley, O’Brien alleged that MERS “has failed to pay the proper recording fees required under Massachusetts statute when a lender assigns a mortgage to another entity.” And this week Coakley announced that she will join her colleagues in several other states in an investigation to see whether MERS is skirting laws regarding such transactions.

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AG Coakley Following Up On Essex County’s O’Brien’s MERS Inquiry

AG Coakley Following Up On Essex County’s O’Brien’s MERS Inquiry


Firm may skirt millions in property fees

Attorney general, others probe system created by lenders

By Jenifer B. McKim Globe Staff / December 15, 2010

Attorney General Martha Coakley is trying to determine whether a lender-created company that tracks mortgage loan data has failed to pay millions of dollars in property recording fees in Massachusetts.

Coakley is taking aim at the little-known but powerful Reston, Va., company whose members include Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase, and other major lenders.

The company, Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems Inc., oversees a database of about 31 million mortgages, about half of the active loans in the United States.

As concern about foreclosure practices mounts across the country, Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems is increasingly being questioned by regulators, lawyers, and housing advocates about the way it operates.

Essex County’s register of deeds, John L. O’Brien Jr., last month asked Coakley to investigate the company, known as MERS. He said that by using its own database for property transfers, MERS does not pay recording fees or disclose the transactions, as Massachusetts law requires.

O’Brien estimated that in Essex County alone, $10 million was lost over the past decade because MERS failed to pay a $75 fee each time a mortgage was transferred between lenders.

“They created their own registry of deeds,’’ he said. “They have to record these assignments. The taxpayers deserve these fees.’’

A spokeswoman for Coakley said her office is looking at the issues O’Brien raised.

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MA Secretary Galvin to File Bill Requiring Court Approval on Foreclosures, Register O’Brien Agrees

MA Secretary Galvin to File Bill Requiring Court Approval on Foreclosures, Register O’Brien Agrees


Bill calls for court OK to foreclose

Galvin says reviews would clarify titles, protect homeowners

“You aren’t going to straighten out the economy of the state until this housing thing gets figured out.” — William F. Galvin, Secretary of state

By Jenifer B. McKim
Globe Staff / December 6, 2010

Secretary of State William F. Galvin plans to submit a bill next month that would force Massachusetts mortgage lenders to get court approval before seizing homes, in an effort to protect homeowners and address concerns about how foreclosures are conducted.

Galvin said he will revive a proposal that state lawmakers rejected two years ago because of new questions about the validity of titles for foreclosed properties — an issue housing specialists say is hampering the state’s real estate market.

“Unless we do something to clean up the titles in these properties we are going to have a big continued problem,’’ Galvin said. “You aren’t going to straighten out the economy of the state until this housing thing gets figured out.’’

Massachusetts is one of 27 states that do not require foreclosures to be reviewed by a judge.

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The Big Lie: MERS Mortgages in Massachusetts by Jamie Ranney, Esq.

The Big Lie: MERS Mortgages in Massachusetts by Jamie Ranney, Esq.


by Jamie Ranney, Esq.
Jamie Ranney, PC
4 Thirty Acres Lane
Nantucket, MA 02554
jamie@nantucketlaw.pro
508-228-9224

This memo will focus on MERS-designated mortgages in Massachusetts.

In this author’s opinion two (2) things are evident after a survey of Massachusetts law.

First, MERS cannot be a valid “mortgagee” under Massachusetts law and thus MERS designated mortgages are invalid in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

This is because MERS-designated mortgages by definition “split” the security instrument (the mortgage) from the debt (the promissory note) when they are signed. This “split” invalidates the mortgage under Massachusetts law. Where the security interest is invalid upon the signing of the mortgage, MERS cannot occupy the legal position of a “mortgagee” under Massachusetts law no matter what language MERS inserts into their mortgages that purports to give them the legal position of “mortgagee”. Since MERSdesignated mortgages are invalid at their inception, it follows logically therefore that MERS mortgages are not legally capable of being recorded in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts by its Registers of Deeds.

Second, even if a MERS-designated mortgage were found to be a valid security instrument in Massachusetts, each and every assignment of the mortgage and note “behind” a MERS-designated mortgage must be recorded on the public land records of the Commonwealth in order to comply with the Massachusetts recording statute at M.G.L. c. 183, s. 4 which requires that “conveyances of an estate” be recorded to be valid. A mortgage is a “conveyance of an estate” under Massachusetts law. Since MERS-designated mortgages exist for the primary purpose of holding “legal” title on the public land records while the “beneficial” interest is transferred and sold multiple times (and a mortgage cannot exist without a note under Massachusetts law), MERS-mortgages unlawfully avoid recording fees due the Commonwealth for the transfer(s) of interests under MERS-designated mortgages.

“If you tell a lie that’s big enough, and you tell it often enough, people will believe you are telling the truth, even when what you are saying is total crap.”1

Continue reading below…

[ipaper docId=44370743 access_key=key-1en9gd3bwhh0zs2atypk height=600 width=600 /]

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County Register of Deeds Picks Fight with MERS

County Register of Deeds Picks Fight with MERS


Richard Zombeck

Richard Zombeck

Eyes and Ears Mortgage Specialist and ShametheBanks.org Founder

Posted: November 29, 2010 01:31 PM
.

About a week ago, John O’Brien, Register of Deeds in Essex County Massachusetts, sent a letter to Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley asking that she look into whether MERS (Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc.) failed to pay legally required recording fees in Massachusetts when a MERS-mortgage is assigned to another entity, like a trust or a bank.

MERS is a privately held company that operates an electronic registry designed to track servicing rights and ownership of mortgage loans in the United States.

MERS has seen a lot of attention of late because of the number of robo-signing cases popping up at banks and mortgage servicers. MERS has no employees, it simply assigns and designates an estimated 20,000 unpaid VPs and officersrecent testimony before Congress. around the country as certifying officers to sign off on mortgage transfers, foreclosures, and assignments, according to R.K. Arnold, President and CEO of Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc., in a

The recording fees Essex County has missed out on as a result of MERS purportedly bypassing normal recording channels was O’Brien’s primary concern.

In his November 18 letter to Attorney General Coakley, O’Brien wrote, “I am writing to ask that you investigate and provide me with an official opinion as to whether or not the Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc. (MERS) has failed to pay the proper recording fees required under Massachusetts statute when a lender assigns a mortgage to another entity.”


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Response to Request from John O’Brien (Essex, Mass. Co. Register of Deeds) to Mass. AG Martha Coakley to Investigate MERS

Response to Request from John O’Brien (Essex, Mass. Co. Register of Deeds) to Mass. AG Martha Coakley to Investigate MERS


In response to questions regarding the letter from Essex Co. (Mass.) Register of Deeds John O’Brien to the Hon. Martha Coakley, Attorney General for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, MERS has not seen the letter nor have we been contacted by the Massachusetts attorney general. We will fully cooperate with any inquiries from appropriate authorities.

It is not the case that recording fees are somehow owed or outstanding. MERS pays recording fees when the mortgage is recorded. Fees are paid for a service performed, and if a document is eliminated because it is no longer necessary, no fee is due because there is nothing to record. In fact, MERS greatly reduces the workload of county recorders, resulting in lower operating expenses for the county recorder’s office. Moreover, it would be the borrower, and not the lender, who ultimately pays the costs of recording assignments, either directly or indirectly.

When servicing rights or promissory notes are sold for loans where MERS is not the mortgagee, the usual practice is for the seller to execute and record an instrument assigning the mortgage lien to the purchaser (commonly referred to as an “assignment”). In general, the primary reason assignments are recorded (in cases where MERS is not the mortgagee), stems from the need of servicers to be in the land records to fully administer the loan on behalf of the mortgage loan owner. In which case, the servicer will be assigned the mortgage lien (thus becoming the mortgagee) in order to receive the service of process related to that mortgage loan. When Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc. is the mortgagee (i.e., holds the legal title to the mortgage lien), there is no need for an assignment of the mortgage lien between its members because MERS remains the mortgagee holding legal title to the mortgage as the common agent for them. It is not the case that the assignments are now being done electronically through the MERS® System instead of being recorded in the land records. The need for an assignment is eliminated because title to the mortgage lien has been grounded in MERS. Moreover, transfers of mortgage notes and servicing rights are not recordable transactions (and have never been reflected in the land records) because they are not a conveyance of an interest in real property that is entitled to be recorded; only the transfer of the lien is a conveyance. The only reason servicers needed to appear in the county land records before MERS was so they could receive legal notices pertaining to the property. Now, MERS as their common agent receives the legal notices. The chain of title starts and stops with Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc. as the mortgagee. MERS, as the agent for the note-owner, holds legal title for the note-owner in the land records.

The use of MERS is in compliance with the statutory intent of the state recording acts. When MERS is the mortgagee, the mortgage is recorded at the county land records, thereby putting the public on notice that there is a lien on the property. The MERS® System also complements the county land records by providing additional information that was never intended to be recorded at the county level, namely the information about the mortgage loan servicer, and now, with the addition of MERS® InvestorID, the name of the investor.

Source: MERS

© 2010-19 FORECLOSURE FRAUD | by DinSFLA. All rights reserved.



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[READ] ‘MERS’ Letter From Essex County Register of Deeds John O’Brien to AG Martha Coakley

[READ] ‘MERS’ Letter From Essex County Register of Deeds John O’Brien to AG Martha Coakley


These are excellent words…

It has been brought to my attention that a number of states have alleged in court filings that MERS intentionally failed to pay recording fees and failed to disclose the transfer and assignments of interest in property, solely to avoid and decrease the recordation fees owed tot he counties and the state.

Letter From Essex County Register of Deeds John O’Brien to AG Martha Coakley

[ipaper docId=43910838 access_key=key-1s9z1zu0nuw8tzlnxo4p height=600 width=600 /]

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