September 30, 2006
Fraud Is Keeping Air In The Real Estate Bubble
The Oregonian
It seems like every month, I’m running into people passing out a slick new business card that announces them as a real estate agent or mortgage broker.
Who wouldn’t want to get a piece of the action? On certain Portland streets, housing prices are doubling in a matter of months. And when there’s this kind of temptation to make quick money, greed can’t be far behind.
Insiders call it land flipping. Silent second. Straw buyers. Foreclosure fraud. Equity skimming. Air loans. If there’s a thought to do it, there’s a scheme attached to it.
"It’s the fastest-growing white collar crime in the country," says California attorney Rachel Dollar, whose Web site, www.mortgagefraudblog.com, helps lenders across the country learn about who’s doing what to whom. "There’s 101,000 schemes. They come up with new ones all the time."
In July, one of Oregon’s most prolific con men, Clifford Brigham — also known as C.J. and Cleveland — and Melodie MacDuffee were indicted on charges that they allegedly defrauded lenders out of $5 million between October 2004 and August 2005. At the time, Brigham was on release from federal prison pending appeal of his 2003 conviction for another scheme.
So, Portland’s latest mortgage fraud allegations — which involve three folks who are well-known in real-estate circles for being financially successful in their craft — are not the most egregious.
Last week, Leanne Booth, 48, a real-estate loan broker; Troy Martin, 40, a real estate sales agent; and Ryan Bonneau, 30, a former mortgage loan originator, were indicted on money laundering and wire fraud charges. They are accused of selling two Marine Drive homes at inflated prices so they could pocket the profits. Between the three of them, they couldn’t have cleared much more than $250,000.
Read more…
It seems like every month, I’m running into people passing out a slick new business card that announces them as a real estate agent or mortgage broker.
Who wouldn’t want to get a piece of the action? On certain Portland streets, housing prices are doubling in a matter of months. And when there’s this kind of temptation to make quick money, greed can’t be far behind.
Insiders call it land flipping. Silent second. Straw buyers. Foreclosure fraud. Equity skimming. Air loans. If there’s a thought to do it, there’s a scheme attached to it.
"It’s the fastest-growing white collar crime in the country," says California attorney Rachel Dollar, whose Web site, www.mortgagefraudblog.com, helps lenders across the country learn about who’s doing what to whom. "There’s 101,000 schemes. They come up with new ones all the time."
In July, one of Oregon’s most prolific con men, Clifford Brigham — also known as C.J. and Cleveland — and Melodie MacDuffee were indicted on charges that they allegedly defrauded lenders out of $5 million between October 2004 and August 2005. At the time, Brigham was on release from federal prison pending appeal of his 2003 conviction for another scheme.
So, Portland’s latest mortgage fraud allegations — which involve three folks who are well-known in real-estate circles for being financially successful in their craft — are not the most egregious.
Last week, Leanne Booth, 48, a real-estate loan broker; Troy Martin, 40, a real estate sales agent; and Ryan Bonneau, 30, a former mortgage loan originator, were indicted on money laundering and wire fraud charges. They are accused of selling two Marine Drive homes at inflated prices so they could pocket the profits. Between the three of them, they couldn’t have cleared much more than $250,000.
Read more…
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