AJC

http://www.ajc.com/news/legislature-considers-new-mortgage-281590.html

Gotta love the AJC ..And old hippe Carrie Teegargin.

This is just another gem from last Sunday's trainwreck. I recently cancelled my day sub and now only receive the Sunday edition. It's all I can take.


This story is full of douchebags: the writer, and the people she writes about.

First, take the opener:

"In his years as a mortgage broker, Bill Enfinger didn’t consider it his job to assure a home loan made sense. The banks decided who qualified and who didn’t. He simply brought borrower and lender together.

In fact, Enfinger marveled at the deals banks approved for some of his clients during the heyday of subprime lending. “I knew it was risky,” he said.

With the results of foolish lending apparent in Georgia’s foreclosure rate and tumbling property values, the Georgia General Assembly will debate whether to require brokers and bankers to carefully evaluate whether a loan is likely to get repaid and whether it’s a good deal for the borrower."

First, these whores have about as much chance of getting this done as I have becoming a jockey. But that is not the point: first we have a broker that knowingly opened loans he knew would not be honored, even though he got his $$$ off the top. Then, it's banks that did not do the proper underwriting. When I bought my first house in East Atlanta in 1997-98 I was required to provide ALL our statements and paychecks, and I had to pay 2 years PMI because I did not have 20% down. But, sometime in the new millennium, all those rules went away!

Enter the 'victim', one Johnnie M Perkins..Here's what the AJC says about this poor unfortunate 'have not':

"In 2007, Perkins refinanced the mortgage on the split-level DeKalb County house she bought in 1994. A former nursing assistant, Perkins is 63 and has been disabled since suffering a back injury in a 1992 car accident. She lives on her Social Security disability check.

She looked into a refinance loan because she was desperate to pay off thousands of dollars in credit card debt. She called a broker in Bill Enfinger’s Columbus-based company for help.

Enfinger said Perkins’ debts kept her from qualifying for a traditional prime loan. But Enfinger said lenders in 2007 permitted loans without income documentation if a borrower had decent credit and some equity in the house. “They were called liar loans, basically,” he said.

That’s what Perkins ended up with. Even though Perkins said she provided her income information, her application showed no income whatsoever.

At the time, her monthly gross income was $1,168. Her new payment, including taxes and insurance: $971.50.

Perkins said she was told the payment would be $767 and would wipe out her other debts. That would have put her in a better financial position. She said she found out right before the closing that the actual payment, including escrow charges she didn’t expect, would be more than $200 higher and still wouldn’t pay off all her credit cards. She said she also did not realize the company did not report her income on the application.

“I was just desperate to get out of credit card debt,” she said. She reluctantly signed the papers, a decision she now regrets.

The loan, made by now defunct NetBank, has actually become a much bigger threat to Perkins’ financial stability than the credit card bills ever were.

Perkins’ loan clearly would have failed the sort of affordability test required by the proposed legislation.

Because the mortgage payment eats so much of her income, she’s resorted to credit cards again to cover living expenses. “It was just a bad, bad business deal I made, thinking I was doing something to set myself free,” Perkins said.

Jennifer Staack, an Atlanta Legal Aid attorney trying to help Perkins negotiate with Fannie Mae, the current owner of the loan, said Perkins’ ability to repay was never considered.

“If the mortgage companies had to actually look at affordability, that would stop a lot of these loans,” she said."

Where to get started. First, this woman was injured in 1992 yet managed to buy a house in Ellenwood in 1994. How much you wanna bet if we look at that first mortage, there was an incentive by Clayton County for 'empowerment zones' and homesteading? How does a woman working not as a nurse, but a nurse assistant, with a crippling back injury, come up with the 20% to move into the house, plus all the added strength and time involved? Did she save up all her 52 years to but this house? Did Teegardin do a little research and find out if this woman had owned a house previously? I mean, did she live in apartments until she was 52? If not, where's the record of her first house ( or marriage?)

Then, she admits she signed paperwork she didn't understand to get out of debt she ran up already. That's a genius move, lady. How much you wanna bet she heard an ad on the urban radio station she listened to saying 'refinance now and clear your debts'! I mean, she hasn't worked since 1992, the hurt back and all, You know, the one that keeps her in the brace or the wheelchair we can see in the picture. The picture of the house with fancy furniture, and applicances and late model car in the driveway...




So now, we need a slimy politician to pass laws requiring the scummy mortgage broker to do more of the bank's legwork, all in the name of 'protecting' some idiot that has proven she can't handle credit, brought to you by a concerned old hippie without a grasp of who is truly at fault here.

Maybe Perkins shouldn't have run up all that debt, or having done so: do the Ramsey method. Sell the fancy house and car and move into a cheap apt in 2007 when the market was still okay and she was refinancing. Pay off your debts and then look for a bargain in today's obliterated market. She could probably rebuy her oringinal house now for 25% below the market value in 2007!!

And slimy broker and bank guys need to better 'splain to thier marks what's goin on.

But instead, we get a tearjerker story about how this poor fool was taken advantage of by the rich, evil white guys.

WTG, AJC