Marc's Mortgage Matter's

A new order is emerging on Wall Street after the worst crisis since the Great Depression — one in which just a couple of victors are starting to tower over the handful of financial titans that used to dominate the industry.

On Thursday, JPMorgan Chase became the latest big bank to announce stellar second-quarter earnings. Its $2.7 billion profit, after record gains for Goldman Sachs, underscores how the government’s effort to halt a collapse has also set the stage for a narrowing concentration of financial power.

“One theme here is that Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan really have emerged as the winners, as the last of the survivors,” said Robert Reich, a professor at the University of California, Berkeley, who was secretary of labor in the Clinton administration.

Both banks now stand astride post-bailout Wall Street, having benefited from billions of dollars in taxpayer support and cheap government financing to climb over banks that continue to struggle. They are capitalizing on the turmoil in financial markets and their rivals’ weakness to pull in billions in trading profits......and more dribble.

Is it just me or does this sound so sick. I mean give me a few billions and I'll get my house in order, my friends, collegues, and neighbors. Heck I'll take just maybe $20 million if need be....spread the wealth....amazing crap!  Oh and Chase (like most other BIG banks) are still charging $35 for every infraction including breathing more then 30 times a minute when standing on line in branches between E21 and E59 in manhattan.

These are the same idiots that say the economy is great now.

New Jersey - State Attorney General Anne Milgram announced today two separate lawsuits charging 10 defendants with mortgage-related fraud. According to the lawsuits, filed on Friday, the companies promised to help modify mortgages for people struggling to keep their homes. But instead of providing assistance, they pocketed the fees paid by homeowners.

"It is some of the most egregious conduct we've seen," Milgram said. "They're trying to profit off someone's misery."

She said the state has identified 42 victims so far, for a minimum of $80,000 in losses. The defendants were charged with violating New Jersey's Consumer Fraud Act, the Debt Adjustment and Credit Counseling Act and state advertising regulations.

One of the lawsuits was filed in Mercer County against Best Interest Rate Mortgage Company, located in Haddon Township.

State officials said the company solicited distressed homeowners in the mail, sending a form that appeared government authorized.

The other lawsuit was filed in Essex County against nine defendants, including Newark attorney Ejike Uzor and Stephen Pasch of Green Brook Township. Also charged are seven corporate and nonprofit entities, including New Day Financial Solutions in Newark.

Including the two lawsuits announced today, the state has filed 11 civil mortgage fraud complaints since June 2008, naming 102 individual and corporate defendants.

Note..how pathetic but if you read into more details and past history on these despicable predators, they were mortgage consultants and salespeople in the past. Obviously they've screwed enough people and with mortgage options dried up, looking for new ways to make money!

Jim died.
His will provided $40,000 for an elaborate funeral.
As the last guests departed the affair, his wife Sharon turned to her oldest and dearest friend. "Well, I'm sure Jim would be pleased," she said.
"I'm sure you're right," replied Brenda, who lowered her voice and leaned in close.
"How much did this really cost?”
"All of it: $40k," said Sharon.
"No!" Brenda exclaimed. "I mean, it was very nice, but $40,000?”
Sharon answered, "The funeral was $6,500. I donated $500 to church. The whiskey, wine and snacks were another $500. The rest went for the Memorial Stone.”
Brenda computed quickly. "$32,500 for a Memorial Stone? How big is it?”

“5 carats.”

Starbucks is reportedly adding alcohol to the menu at one of its stores. When asked why, a spokesperson for Starbucks said, "Because sober people don't pay eight bucks for a cup of coffee."

Thousands of top traders and bankers on Wall Street were awarded huge bonuses and pay packages last year, even as their employers were battered by the financial crisis.

Nine of the financial firms that were among the largest recipients of federal bailout money paid about 5,000 of their traders and bankers bonuses of more than $1 million apiece for 2008, according to a report released Thursday by Andrew M. Cuomo, the New York attorney general.

At Goldman Sachs, for example, bonuses of more than $1 million went to 953 traders and bankers, and Morgan Stanley awarded seven-figure bonuses to 428 employees. Even at weaker banks like Citigroup and Bank of America, million-dollar awards were distributed to hundreds of workers.

The report is certain to intensify the growing debate over how, and how much, Wall Street bankers should be paid.

In January, President Obama called financial institutions “shameful” for giving themselves nearly $20 billion in bonuses as the economy was faltering and the government was spending billions to bail out financial institutions.

On Friday, the House of Representatives may vote on a bill that would order bank regulators to restrict “inappropriate or imprudently risky” pay packages at larger banks.

Mr. Cuomo, who for months has criticized the companies over pay, said the bonuses were particularly galling because the banks survived the crisis with the government’s support.

“If the bank lost money, where do you get the money to pay the bonus?” he said.

All the banks named in the report declined to comment.

......stand back, I'm about to throw up again :(

A guy fell asleep on the beach in Florida for several hours and got horrible sunburn, specifically to his upper legs. He went to the hospital, and was promptly admitted after being diagnosed with second-degree burns.
With his skin already starting to blister, and the severe pain he was in, the doctor prescribed continuous intravenous feeding with saline, electrolytes, a sedative, and a Viagra pill every four hours.

The nurse, who was rather astounded, asked, “What good will Viagra do for him, doctor?”
The doctor replied, “It won't do anything for his condition, but it'll keep the sheets off his legs.”

Three friends from the local congregation were asked, "When you're in your casket, and friends and congregation members are mourning over you, what would you like them to say?"
Artie said: "I would like them to say I was a wonderful husband, a fine spiritual leader, and a great family man."
Tad commented: "I would like them to say I was a wonderful teacher and servant of God who made a huge difference in people's lives."
Robbie said: "I'd like them to say, ‘Look, he's moving!’”

As property values in the New York area slide, more borrowers are finding themselves “underwater,” which means they owe more than their homes are worth.

This month, the Federal Housing Finance Agency unveiled a new version of its Home Affordable Refinance Program, whereby lenders can offer new mortgages to borrowers even if their home’s value exceeds the mortgage amount by as much as 25 percent — as long as the borrower hasn’t missed loan payments in the past year.

Under the initial plan announced in February, lenders could refinance a loan only if the borrower’s mortgage was no more than 5 percent greater than the home’s value. With property values in many areas down sharply from their peak levels, 5 percent wasn’t enough to help many borrowers.

So why help borrowers who have not missed a payment?

Without a way to refinance into better loans, some of these borrowers could become part of the next wave of foreclosures.

Many are stuck with high interest rates or with rates that could adjust upward in the coming years. To make matters worse, lenders and mortgage insurers have tightened underwriting rules, typically requiring borrowers to have at least 15 percent equity in a home.

There is some fine print in this refinancing program. Borrowers must hold a loan that was purchased by Freddie Mac or Fannie Mae, the government-controlled companies that buy most mortgages. To determine whether you have a Fannie or Freddie loan, go to the “loan lookup” tab on the Web site MakingHomeAffordable.gov.

Most fixed-rate mortgages under $417,000 were financed through Fannie or Freddie, as were some more recent loans of up to $729,750 in higher-cost areas like Manhattan.

Also, borrowers who are 25 percent underwater cannot apply for new loans for at least a few weeks, depending on how quickly lenders prepare their systems to accept these new applications. October is probably the earliest these loans will close.

If you qualify, your interest rate will very likely be slightly higher than the market’s best loan rates, especially if you refinance with someone other than your current servicer. And if you are 5 to 25 percent underwater with a Fannie Mae loan, you must refinance with your current servicer to qualify.

(A servicer is different from a mortgage originator. You might, say, have taken out a mortgage from Countrywide. That loan was probably acquired by Fannie Mae, which then resold it, in a package of mortgages, to an investor. That lender may have hired a bank like Chase to collect payments, or “service” the loan.)

When borrowers seek to refinance through a new lender on loans where the borrower is merely 5 percent underwater, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will issue surcharges that can add four-tenths of a percentage point on the interest rate, or can be paid in the form of points.

Tom Kelly, a spokesman with JPMorgan Chase, said that his bank had not yet determined its charges for applicants whose loans it services, specifically those whose loans are 25 percent greater than a home’s value.

Although these rates may be higher than those paid by so-called prime borrowers, they are a boon for those who are underwater and who would otherwise have no choice but to keep their loan and hope property values rebound, or walk away from their investment.

A woman walked into her ex-husband's house with a chicken under her arm.
She says, "This is the pig I was in love with."
Her ex-husband retorts, "That’s a chicken, not a pig."
The woman responds, "I was talking to the chicken."

I got very excited yesterday, and I think "my ship has finally come in". I received an e-mail saying that I had won the “Spanish El Gordo” lottery with a prize of one million pesetas, even though Spain uses the Euro. I knew it was for real since it said, “REFERENCE NUMBER: FCB/09/001, BATCH NUMBER: 2009/430/SPELG”, and then had some Spanish sentences. Very official. There was no way it was fake, but since I know that you can’t always trust the internet, I sent them my social security number and driver’s license numbers via mail instead of over the net.


Given the lack of economic news, yesterday’s focus was on Fed President Ben Bernanke. Not only did his testimony begin yesterday, but the Wall Street Journal published a column written by him in the morning. The column discussed “The Fed's Exit Strategy”, which immediately drew criticism from analysts who feel that it is too early to discuss an exit strategy. One has to wonder about that, given that there are many who believe that the stock market performance over the last few weeks is evidence that the worst is over. “The depth and breadth of the global recession has required a highly accommodative monetary policy…the Federal Reserve has reduced the interest-rate target for overnight lending between banks (the federal-funds rate) nearly to zero, greatly expanded the size of the Fed’s balance sheet through purchases of longer-term securities and through targeted lending programs aimed at restarting the flow of credit. These actions have softened the economic impact of the financial crisis. They have also improved the functioning of key credit markets, including the markets for interbank lending, commercial paper, consumer and small-business credit, and residential mortgages. My colleagues and I believe that accommodative policies will likely be warranted for an extended period. At some point, however, as economic recovery takes hold, we will need to tighten monetary policy to prevent the emergence of an inflation problem down the road…”


During his testimony, the market absorbed statements like “tentative signs of stabilization”, “keeping rates low for an extended period of time”, “financial conditions remain stressed”, “housing decline appears to have moderated”, “record budget deficits may begin to pose a threat to the economy”, and “doubt on fiscal sustainability may hurt recover”. (Remember that confidence and trust are critical to any recovery.) Generally speaking, the markets see no substantial change from the Fed’s current policies as they “stay the course”. The federal funds rate will likely remain near zero for an extended period of time, the possibility, granted by Congress, to pay interest rates on the balances held at the central bank by depository institutions. (Paying more on those reserves would likely push up market rates.) In addition, the Fed could drain liquidity from the system through reverse repurchase agreements, selling securities from the central bank's portfolio with an agreement to buy them back later, and obviously could also sell the central bank’s holdings of long-term maturities outright.

Sometimes I think that computers are great, other times not. Over the weekend I went to Costco, where they always pass your card over the reader prior to ringing up your purchases. By the time I was through the line, and about ready to buy my Dad his obligatory lunch hot dog and soda, a customer service rep with a clipboard approached me. He said, “Excuse me sir, I see that you’ve been a member for about a year, and that you’ve spent $---- at Costco during that time. Do you know that if you’d signed up for the Executive Membership, you would qualify for a rebate of $---?” Obviously they, and other stores if you use a membership number or credit card, can track every purchase you make. I almost expected the Costco guy to say, “And I notice that you’ve bought the 24-pack of donuts the last 3 times… did you see our special on exercise equipment on aisle 8?”

USA Today says that Chrysler is trying to make its cars more appealing by painting them in bright colors like orange and lime green. They're also trying to make them more appealing by painting the name “Toyota” on them.

Knowing the right name is important. What is the difference, in government securities, between a “bill”, a “note”, and a “bond”? Usually “bills” are anything with a maturity of 1 year or less, a “note” matures between 1 year and 10 years, and a bond is longer than 10 years. Yesterday we had the Treasury auction off $35 billion of 3-yr notes. Simply put, it went well. On top of that, the government was in buying their usual amount of $4-5 billion a day of mortgage origination. And today we have $19 billion of 5-yr notes to buy.

BOSTON — Inna Komarovskaya was ready to do her part to revive the economy: She found a “really cute” condo to buy. Despite a good credit score, a six-figure income and an ample down payment, Dr. Komarovskaya, a recent dental school graduate, could not get a loan. Her mortgage broker told her she ran afoul of new rules requiring two years of sufficient tax returns from some home buyers, instead of only one.

“Everyone says this is a buyer’s market, but they wouldn’t let me buy,” said Dr. Komarovskaya, 30. “It’s not fair.”

Not fair, perhaps, but far from unique, brokers and agents say. The readiness of banks to sell foreclosed properties has led to rising home sales in some areas. But the traditional housing market, the one that involves willing buyers and sellers, is still dead, with transactions lower than they have been for decades.

The recession is the major reason sales are dragging, of course, but it is not the only one. As Dr. Komarovskaya found, buyers once viewed as perfectly qualified are being denied mortgages.

Brokers and bankers say that in past decades, the credit markets would almost certainly have accommodated many of these people.

“The credit pendulum is stuck at ‘stupid,’” said Lou S. Barnes, an owner of Boulder West Financial Services, a Colorado mortgage bank. “I am turning down loans every day that my grandfather in his Ponca City, Okla., savings and loan in 1935 would have been happy to make. And he was tough.”

The denials are occurring for a wide array of reasons: the buyers’ incomes are adequate but irregular; they are self-employed and take many deductions, reducing the taxable income on which lenders focus; their credit scores are below the cut-off point, which has been raised drastically; their down payments are less than 20 percent.

Housing usually leads the country into a recession, which certainly happened this time, and also leads it out — which will not happen in 2010, the real estate industry contends, without stronger efforts to thaw the market.

No one is advocating a return to the lax lending standards of 2006, when buyers with no income or documentation could get loans. But many people say they believe lenders and the government, in correcting the excesses of that era, have gone too far in the other direction.

Fannie Mae, the government-controlled company that buys mortgages, is so dominant in the lending market that its rules set the standard. It recently toughened its policies, saying it would count only 70 percent of the value of stocks and mutual funds when calculating a buyer’s assets. Previously, that figure was 100 percent.

A Fannie spokesman, Brian Faith, said tighter regulations screened out those unprepared to be owners.

“One of the important lessons learned in the past few years is that it is not enough to help a borrower own a home,” Mr. Faith said. “We must also help ensure that they will be able to stay in the home over the long term.”

Mortgage brokers say those who are being rejected for loans are often entrepreneurs who are used to taking risks. “They are chomping at the bit to get into this market, but are forced to the sidelines,” said Stuart Fraass of Guaranteed Rate Inc. “If you’re self-employed, you have virtually no chance of getting a mortgage now.”

Mr. Fraass was unable to help Raghbir Singh, a real estate investor who owns a gas station in Dover, N.H. Mr. Singh tried to buy a $301,000 house for himself and his family with 10 percent down and excellent credit, but was rejected. “It was unfair,” Mr. Singh said. “I’m a good risk, but I’m forced to rent.”

Lately, the continued deep-freeze in the traditional market has to some extent been veiled by the brisk sale of foreclosed houses. In April, distressed transactions made up nearly half of all existing house and condo sales, the National Association of Realtors said. In May, they were a third.

That means traditional or so-called move-up sales, where the parties at both ends of the transaction are individuals instead of banks, are limping along at an annual rate of about three million, the lowest figure in a quarter-century.

“Without further action, we’re not going to stabilize,” said Steve Murray of Real Trends, a Denver research group. “The real estate recovery will take 10 or 12 years.”

There are plenty of plans to unlock the market.

Members of Congress are proposing to extend and enlarge an $8,000 credit for first-time buyers, which is due to expire in December. One bill would extend the credit to all buyers through next June. Another would extend it to all buyers through 2010. A third bill would expand it to $15,000 for all buyers.

Some economists, noting that tax incentives helped stoke the boom, say these proposals should be shunned. “When do you decide enough is enough?” said the housing consultant Ivy Zelman. “I don’t want to feed the drug addict with more drugs.”

The continuing deterioration in traditional real estate can be seen in the market in Massachusetts, where the economy, as measured by the unemployment rate, is better than in the nation as a whole.

Yet sales of single-family homes in Massachusetts in May were tied for the lowest level for the month in the 22 years since reliable statistics were first assembled, according to Timothy M. Warren Jr. of the Warren Group, which collects real estate data. Condo sales were only marginally better.

As bleak as those numbers may be, they do not fully convey the troubles here in the upper half of the market. In towns where the median home price is above $500,000, sales during the first five months of the year were 21 percent below the level of 1990, when the state’s population was smaller and the local economy equally in crisis.

Real estate agents, always optimistic, had looked for some recovery this spring, the strongest season in the Northeast. Mr. Warren said he was more pessimistic, but was disappointed anyway. “There’s a lot of pent-up demand, but it takes nerves of steel to buy,” he said.

Dr. Komarovskaya, the rejected dentist, tries to be philosophical about missing out on that two-bedroom condo she wanted in the Dorchester neighborhood of Boston. She understands that after years of mortgage abuse and fraud, the rules had to be tightened.

But what might be an inevitable process in the larger economy is a burden on her personal finances. “Renting is a waste of money,” she said. Having no choice, she has dropped plans to buy and signed a new apartment lease.

A blond decides to try horseback riding, even though she has had no lessons or prior experience. She mounts the horse, unassisted, and the horse immediately springs into motion. It gallops along at a steady and rhythmic pace, but the blond begins to slip from the saddle.
In terror, she grabs for the horse's mane, but cannot seem to get a firm grip. She tries to throw her arms around the horse's neck, but she slides down the side of the horse anyway.
The horse gallops along, seemingly impervious to its slipping rider.
Finally, giving up her frail grip, the blond attempts to leap away from the horse and throw herself to safety.
Unfortunately, her foot has become entangled in the stirrup, and she is now at the mercy of the horse's pounding hooves as her head is struck against the ground over and over.

As her head is battered against the ground, she is mere moments away from unconsciousness when to her great fortune Bill, the Wal-Mart greeter, sees her and unplugs the horse.

When I graduated from Cal with a fresh business degree, I tried to get an apartment in Manhattan. They wouldn’t let me in. I knew it would be expensive, but I just assumed that for $2,000 a month, the toilet would be inside the apartment. That has changed a little, since in the last year Manhattan apartment sales dropped more than 50% and the average price dropped about 23%. The average price of Manhattan apartment in the second quarter slid to $1.3 million down from $1.7 million a year earlier, according to a Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Estate report. Gee, are tougher mortgage requirements and unemployment having an impact?



LOS ANGELES NYT62909 — Somewhere on earth, there must be a more difficult task than this: persuading American mortgage companies to lower payments for homeowners who can no longer afford their loans. But as Karina Montenegro struggles to accomplish this feat for a troubled borrower, she strains to imagine a more futile pursuit. 

Montenegro, an intern at a local company that seeks loan modifications, dials Washington Mutual to check on the status of an application for a homeowner whose income has plummeted. She endures a Muzak-scored purgatory while on hold. Syrupy-voiced customer service representatives chide her for landing in the wrong department. She learns that the documents her company sent in have simply vanished — for the third time since November.

“I don’t know what happened,” says a customer service officer who identifies himself as Chris. “I don’t know if there was a glitch in the system, whether it was transferred from one call center to the other.”

Think of the documents as being part of a pile massing inside the bank, Chris suggests. “This pile is not going to be moved forward at any point in time.”

Ms. Montenegro and her colleagues suffer these sorts of excruciating exchanges all day long. It is a potent indication of the difficulties afflicting the $75 billion taxpayer-financed program created by the Obama administration in an effort to avoid foreclosure for as many as four million distressed homeowners.

Under the plan, the government offers mortgage companies $1,000 for each loan they agree to modify, then another $1,000 a year for up to three years.

Hanging in the balance is more than the fate of individual homeowners. The administration portrays its mortgage program as a crucial piece of its broader effort to restore vigor to the economy. If the effort fails, foreclosures will continue to surge and home prices will probably keep falling, sowing fresh losses in the financial system and threatening to crimp credit anew for businesses and households.

Yet in the four months since the Treasury Department announced the program, millions of new homeowners have slipped into delinquency and foreclosure. For now, progress is constrained by the limited capacities of mortgage servicing companies, said Michael S. Barr, the assistant Treasury secretary for financial institutions. He offered the first signs of the administration’s impatience with the institutions that control home loans.

“They need to do a much better job on the basic management and operational side of their firms,” Mr. Barr said. “What we’ve been pushing the servicers to do is improve their infrastructure to make sure their call centers are doing a better job. The level of training is not there yet.”

The administration still does not know how many mortgages have been modified under the program. In a recent interview, Mr. Barr estimated the number at “over 50,000,” explaining that precise figures must wait for a soon-to-be-completed tracking system.

By the end of August, the program should produce 20,000 loan modifications a week, he said.

Tom Kelly, a spokesman for JPMorgan Chase, which now owns Washington Mutual, affirmed the administration’s criticism.

“We’ve done a lot,” he said, noting that the bank has added 950 loan counselors since the beginning of the year, bringing the total to 3,500. “But we’ve got a lot more to do.”

Two days in Los Angeles — where a loan modification company allowed a reporter to listen as its agents contacted mortgage servicers provided the firm not be named — starkly illustrated the problems.

The company charges homeowners $3,000, typically upfront, as it seeks to persuade lenders to rewrite loan documents so as to lower monthly payments. The company says it refunds the money when it fails to secure a modification.

For Ms. Montenegro, a college student at the University of Southern California, her summer job makes for fitting symmetry. In high school, she worked as a clerk at a Washington Mutual branch in Downey, Calif., which specialized in mortgages that invited customers to make such tiny payments that their balances increased.

Many homeowners did not understand the terms: Once they owed a lot more than their house was worth, their payments spiked. Now, that day has come, and Ms. Montenegro is working the other side. She calls WaMu, as the bank is known, trying to cut deals.

Among her clients is Vladimir Vishmid, who owes $490,000 on the mortgage for his three-bedroom home in the Sherman Oaks section of Los Angeles. Mr. Vishmid’s income as a self-employed computer engineer has plummeted, making it hard for him to make his $2,542 monthly payments. He is current on his loan, he says, but behind on his car insurance and utilities.

Software on Ms. Montenegro’s computer logs the details of the three applications her company has submitted for Mr. Vishmid. Chris, the WaMu representative, is telling her to send in No. 4.

“Personally, I’d submit a new file,” Chris counsels. “I’m telling you honestly, anything over 30 days is a new submission for us.”

For Ms. Montenegro, “honestly” is one of those words marinated in so much irony that her eyes roll. Two weeks earlier, she called the bank to check on the file and was told it was being reviewed. Now, it has disappeared.

“So, if I wouldn’t have called, we wouldn’t have known?” Ms. Montenegro scolds.

“It would have just sat in the queue and nothing would have happened,” Chris says. “I wish I had a better explanation.”

In the same office, Ms. Montenegro’s colleague, Sean Milotta, has run into a problem on a loan billed by American Home Mortgage Servicing. Though the borrower appears eligible for the Obama administration plan, the company refuses to take an application because the loan is owned by an investor who is unwilling to absorb a loss.

In another office down the hall, Ramin Lavi, 27, has picked up the file of Alice Descovich, who is seeking to shave down the $708,000 she owes on a mortgage serviced by WaMu for her home in Alameda, Calif. As the interest rates reset in coming months, it will become even harder for her to make the payments, which are now $4,400 a month.

A note in the system shows that the bank confirmed receiving documents on April 29 — pay stubs, tax returns, a letter disclosing her hardship, bank statements. Since then, the company has been waiting for WaMu to review the file.

But when Mr. Lavi calls, a representative coolly discloses that the application has been rejected because one document, a proof-of-insurance form, is missing. He must start over.

“The file had been submitted properly, and you didn’t put the pieces together,” Mr. Lavi says, his body quivering with anger. “I’m not going to stand in line again for another six months.”

He demands to speak to a supervisor, but the representative says none is free. He hangs up and redials, hoping to land in a different call center. Eventually, he reaches Chase’s executive offices, where Becky takes over the call.

“We’re not taking cases now,” she says calmly.

“Why was I transferred to you?” Mr. Lavi asks. Becky does not know. He implores her to keep the file open while he faxes in the lone missing document.

“Impossible,” she says, warning of “the sheer amount of papers coming in.”

Another agent, Lee Wasser, props his feet on an adjacent desk chair as he waits on hold for more than 20 minutes to speak with GMAC Mortgage.

His clients, Dean and Nancy Piercy, owe $380,000 on the loan for their home in Shasta Lake, Calif. A logger, Mr. Piercy has lost work hours, making it hard for them keep up with their $2,048 monthly payment — soon set to rise.

Mr. Wasser has already negotiated a solution: GMAC will accept only $270,000 in repayment, allowing the couple to get a fixed rate mortgage from another bank.

But that suddenly is in disarray. The Piercys have been making their payments, but GMAC has been putting their checks aside, holding the money as “loss mitigation fees,” until their application is completed. It has notified credit bureaus that their loan is more than 90 days delinquent, which has lowered their credit score, disqualifying them for the next mortgage.

Mr. Wasser reaches GMAC’s loss mitigation department. He asks for the delinquency to be removed from their status. But that must be handled by a different department: customer service. He is transferred there, where Jessica picks up the call.

“We are not going to amend,” she says, after a strained back and forth. If Mr. Wasser wants it otherwise, he will have to talk to loss mitigation.

“I just talked to them five minutes ago,” he tells Jessica.

“No, you didn’t.”

“Are you accusing me of lying?”

Mr. Wasser asks for Jessica’s employee identification number, but the line goes dead. Jessica has apparently hung up.


In other business/moral news, Russia closed down its casinos overnight as gambling was banned nationwide, which may impact over 300,000 workers. According to the Reuters story, “Vladimir Putin, now prime minister, came up with the idea in 2006 when he was president after the Interior Ministry linked several gaming operations in Moscow to Georgian organized crime. The Kremlin plans to restrict gambling to Las Vegas-style gaming zones in four rarely visited regions deemed to need investment, including one near the North Korea border, but nothing has been built and critics say the zones will fail. Though gaming establishments knew the shutdown date for at least a year, few thought the government would go through with it, but officials moved in overnight to close them down.”

Last week I asked my doctor, "Should I reduce my alcohol intake, and consume more fruit and grains?" She replied, "No, not at all. Wine is made from fruit. Brandy is distilled wine, which means they take the water out of the fruity stuff so you get even more of the goodness that way. Beer is also made out of grain. Bottoms up!"