News By Edition

A Maryland title company owner was sentenced to six years in prison and ordered to pay restitution of $4 million to victims of a five year scheme to divert or hold mortgage payoff funds from clients’ closings. Read on for more details.

While reading through several court cases during the last few weeks, as well as talking to some industry members to get their take on those decisions, I realized that this year may be the year of clarity from the courts.

After years of debate, a confusing and perhaps contradictory policy statement and a split among the circuit courts, members of the real estate community will soon have an answer to a question that has plagued them for a long time — whether Section 8(b) of RESPA prohibits a real estate settlement services provider from charging an unearned fee only if the fee is divided between two or more parties. While many expect the court’s decision to be a close one, and no one can predict how the court will rule, industry members agreed that some interesting topics came out of the oral arguments and that no matter what, the industry will receive clarity from the court’s decision.

In a win for industry members seeking access to property records at a reasonable cost, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled in favor of two title search companies who sought a writ of mandamus ordering the Cuyahoga County Fiscal Officer to provide electronic copies of real estate title documents at the actual cost of copying the digital images of the requested documents. Read on to find out the court’s reasoning.

A borrower who feels he was wrongfully foreclosed upon sued numerous entitles involved in the origination and servicing of his loan, including the title company that handled his closing. Read on to find out what the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California had to say when the defendants filed a motion to dismiss several of his claims.

A Florida settlement attorney and four co-conspirators have been charged with conspiracy to commit mail fraud for their alleged roles in a scheme in which double HUD-1s to defraud lenders of millions of dollars. Read on to find out more.

Last year the U.S. Supreme Court decided that the Federal Arbitration Act preempted a California law regarding the unconscionability of arbitration waivers. Until that point, a class action suit against several title insurers alleging their settlement agents violated individual closing protection letters did not address the letters’ arbitration clause. Once the decision was rendered, however, the title insurers indicated their intent to arbitrate and asked the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey to compel arbitration.

A title company owner from Hover, Ala., was sentenced to time in prison for his role in a mortgage fraud scheme in which he falsified ownership records so his co-conspirators could obtain mortgage loans. Read on for the details.

The New Jersey legislature is considering a bill that would require mortgage holders to issue pay-off letters to facilitate the payment of residential property mortgages as well as additional processes to discharge them of record. Read on to find out more about the potential new procedures.

A bill under consideration in Alaska is doing double duty, providing for residency requirements for title insurance producers as well as a ban on private transfer fees. Read on to find out more details.

To fulfill a capital contribution requirement with his investment company, the owner of property in Scottsdale, Ariz., delivered the property to the company by quitclaim deed. When it was discovered that there was a mortgage on the property and it was being sold at trustee’s sale, the owner sued his title company to enforce the policy. Read on to find out more.

Federal Housing Finance Agency Acting Director Edward DeMarco sent Congress a strategic plan for the next phase of the conservatorships of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Read on to find out what DeMarco’s goals are for the government sponsored enterprises’ next stage.

Appraisers take a lot of heat from lenders, appraisal management companies, Realtors and others who have developed a mistrust of the appraiser community over the past decade. Now is a crucial time for appraisers to repair that damaged image and work hard to regain their client’s trust. Valuation Review is hosting a Webinar on March 8 that will instruct appraisers on how to better their business practices to earn back the trust of their customers. Read on for the details on what this Webinar will offer.

The California General Assembly is considering a bill that would increase the maximum amount required to record a real estate instrument and amend the definition of real estate instrument. Read on to find out more about the bill.

An attorney from Crescent Springs, Ky., was recently disbarred for stealing more than $1.1 million in closing funds during five closings. He had previously pleaded guilty to bank fraud in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio. Read on for more details.

A judge in Kentucky has become one of the first judges to render a decision in a suit county recording officers have brought against Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems Inc., its parent company and banks that used the MERS system to record assignments. Read on to find out why the court rejected the clerks’ arguments and granted MERS summary judgment.

Within days of releasing its last round of combined disclosure prototypes and beginning testing on those forms, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau explained how it planned to proceed with the next steps in making new disclosures a reality — creating regulations to govern the use of those forms. To find out more about its next plans, including how it plans to use a small business review panel to review its rule-making proposals, read on.

South Carolina’s signature on a bill to restrict private transfer fees makes South Carolina the 38th state to reject ban these fees. Read on to find out more about the efforts in South Carolina, as well as where else the fight against these fees has been won.

After a correspondent lender got sued for loss on a fraudulent loan it conducted on behalf of another bank, it went after the escrow agent who made the disbursement that caused the loss. Read on to find out what happened when the escrow agent tried to dismiss the claims against it.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is out in Austin, Texas, this week, testing its final prototypes of the loan estimate and settlement disclosure. Read on to find out what the next steps are in making these forms a reality.

Quicken Loans was quick to release a statement reacting to oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court in which the lender was sued for allegedly charging unearned fees to borrowers. The court will answer a question that has split U.S. circuit courts, whether a fee split is required to constitute a RESPA violation. Read on to find out what the lender had to say a day after presenting its argument to the highest court in the land.

After purchasing property with what it thought was clear title at a foreclosure sale, an insured purchaser was drawn into a lien dispute. Though the title company defended the owner and cleared title to the property, the owner sued its title agent and underwriter for not clearing title sooner.

Following a nearly five-week jury trial, co-defendants in a mortgage fraud scheme run by a former Dallas Cowboy were convicted on all counts of a superseding indictment. Read on to find out more about the scheme and the defendants’ potential sentencing.

The U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts had to address that issue in part after the purchaser of property at a post-foreclosure sale, sued the seller, Freddie Mac, for not upholding its promise to purchase her owner’s title insurance policy if she agreed to use the insurer of its choosing. Read on to find out more about the case and what the court had to say when Freddie Mac moved to dismiss the complaint.

New Jersey agents may no longer be responsible for transmitting estimated gross income tax payments and estimated tax forms for certain nonresidential real estate transactions, if a bill under consideration in the New Jersey legislature is adopted. Read on to find out more.

The General Assembly of Maryland is contemplating a bill that, if passed would require a purchaser in a foreclosure sale to close within a certain time period, as well as record the deed transferring title to the property within a certain amount of time. Read on to find out more.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau launched a new web-based tool to help the public make specific recommendations on how the agency may streamline the regulations within its purview. Read on to find out more about its new tool.