An Army of Fools Are Being Parted From Their Money

Elaine Meinel Supkis

Today, several newspapers carried a story about people who are behind in their mortgage payments being swindled by crooks who promise to 'fix' their woes if they only hand over the deed to the property. Then they wring out all the equity and leave the home up to its eyeballs in debt. One asks, how stupid can people be? Well, I say, this is a perfect parable for the entire USA: we are giving the deed to our entire economy and nation to crooks who promise to fix our financial affairs but all they are doing is loading up everything with debts! And our government is assisting them in this rip-off!

From the New York Times:

With the housing market in decline, financial predators are finding yet another way to take advantage of people who fall behind on their payments.

The schemes take various forms and often involve promises to distressed homeowners of cash upfront, free monthly rent and a chance to retain their houses in the long run. But in the process, someone else takes over the deed, borrows as much as possible against the value of the house and pockets the cash. And, almost always, the homeowners still end up losing their homes.

Everyone wants to have their cake and eat it too. But adults who are responsible understand this is impossible so they bite the bullet and do the right thing. Bad things can happen, stuff we never expect. Deaths, injuries, a disabled child is born or a parent's health deteriorates, whatever. Sometimes, when bad things happen, one has to move quickly, looking ahead, one must make hard choices and then act on them.

For example, when my husband had to leave his job due to chemical poisoning, we were in the middle of building our house. For three months, we did just fine, he got his pay checks and all was well except for his deteriorating health.

Then he became so ill, he was near death so he was fired. We had to go to court and the first thing I asked was, 'How many years will this take?' It was more than three! Well, we applied for Social Security Disabilty and were turned down even though my husband was now locked up in a secure facility for people with brain damage!

My lawyer said, 'How on earth can he work? This is impossible.' But Social Security told us, we had to sue them. So we did. This was another 3 year ordeal. The same day we were told this, I sat down in our temporary housing, a smallish tent, and drew up a five year plan for living on nearly nothing. My son and I designed a large tent complex and we went to junk yards and sent out word to builders, we needed help and help did pour in so we had a six room tent built and someone gave us a Victorian woodstove which I still use in winter, for example.

People volunteered to cut firewood, I would go to food pantries for the poor and do work at them for boxes of food. I raised my own vegetables and chickens and lambs so we had a good variety except in winter, of course. The main thing is, I doubled up my labor surviving and tried to make things work until we won all our cases and I could resume building my home.

From the New York Times:

Ms. Johnson called the Home Savers Consulting Corporation, a Brooklyn company that advertised help for people facing foreclosure. “I saw the advertisement in a local paper,” she recalled. “I was in a tight situation and was scared to death I was going to lose my house.”

Because the Johnsons’ home had risen in value, they could have sold it and paid off about $275,000 in debt. But they wanted to remain in the house.

The sad stories in this article today feature people who ceased earning good money and instead of selling their homes and living within their present limited means, tried to cheat and live as before. And to do this, they fell for the siren songs of the con man. He would coo to them that they had to do absolutely nothing, he would even give them extra cash! And they could live in peace and plenty and he would pay for everything. Like babies, they would then sign over their deeds to these con men and find out, it was all a lie.

People who live like this can't hold property. To hold property, one has to pay attention to the future. One has to plan ahead and think about bad things like accidents, illness and bad luck. If a person wishes to own property, they must think ahead. They must consult with professionals who give them a harsh appraisal, not people telling them fairy tales.

The oldest rule is, 'If it sounds too good to be true, it is a scam.' And simpler form: 'A fool and his money are soon parted.' To protect the gullible members of the public, the adults running the government and banks have to be responsible people who don't lie, don't scam, don't...hell. This makes me very sick to my stomach. For the woes of these people who refuse to sell houses that have good equity in them and are saleable, hoping instead to stay put and live high off the hog via a magic game with total strangers, this is our government. This is the Treasury. This is our Federal Reserves that has no reserves.

From the New York Times:

Aleem Morris, 30, who lost his job as a forklift operator three years ago, answered that flier. Behind in his mortgage payments on a two-story home in the Vailsburg neighborhood of Newark where he lived with his ailing 82-year-old grandfather, Mr. Morris was desperate. He had borrowed money from family and friends, but the house went into foreclosure in February 2005. He owed $118,000.

Mr. Morris said he met with Kenneth McKinnon, an official at Equitable Real Estate, and told him that he had bad credit, no job and was losing his house.

According to Mr. Morris, Mr. McKinnon said those troubles could vanish. Equitable would arrange for someone else to buy the house — temporarily, as it was explained to him. In return, Mr. Morris would receive $20,000 in cash and someone else would make monthly payments while he and his grandfather lived there for a year.

Along the way, the monthly payments would be made in Mr. Morris’ name, repairing his credit, so that he could qualify for a new mortgage. After a year, the Morrises could buy the house back for $315,000.

I used to help a developer buy distressed properties. We didn't cheat anyone or scam them but there were always people who would make a deal such as demanding to live as tenants in houses they sell because their finances were awful. Mr. C would agree and they get one year in the house they used to own plus a tidy profit on the sale. We were always perfectly clear that we were buying and this was a legal process that requires lawyers and they should have one.

Few ever wanted a lawyer. They would pocket everything and think they were very smart. But then comes eviction day a year later. Then the weeping and wailing would begin. Long before the lease is up, I would visit and re-explain the facts and urge them to use the profits of the sales to get themselves better housing (these were all slums badly in need of repairs). Because I and the work crew would be busy fixing the buildings while occupied, the tenants loved this newness and wanted to stay forever, of course. But not pay more rent on a much-improved building!

And invariably, they lost the profits from the sales long before the year is up. These sorts of people make bad tenants because they can't plan ahead and budget their activities. They simply spend money. And this reminds me of a very big nation called the USA. I have bought distressed buildings and had to deal with these sorts of people in my own past. I am generous and kind but also firm. A deal is a deal. And since I always use a lawyer and carefully explain everything very clearly and also give many options for help, it never ceased to amaze me how people think everyone is supposed to be Santa Claus and they, little children on Christmas Eve.

My specialty was houses on the verge of death. Filthy, burned out sections from careless fires, some smelled so gross, my work crew and I would run outside to retch in the gutters. I had to battle bugs, bats and some very large rats. Water damage, broken windows and doors, these were total rehabs. The houses in this story are not such buildings. They are normal houses with normal people, not drunks and druggies.

But the story is similar. I had a rich neighbor who lived life big. Got a young second wife who was pretty. Had a mansion, the big house next to my own property, he had a Jaguar and took vacations that lasted half a year. His place was beautiful and he spent money as if he were the President of the USA. And one day, he went bankrupt so he vandalized his house and property and tried to steal as much value out of it as possible. In other words, he was a reckless spender who used loans to leverage the stock market. When the .com crash hit him, he went from being a multimillionaire with a jet to a criminal who was trying to steal from the bank which held his loans!

From the NYT:

According to participants in the RYM Tech program, company officials promised that if the troubled homeowners signed over their property deeds to RYM Tech and made monthly loan payments as usual, in five years they would get their homes back, free of any mortgage.

RYM Tech said it would use the equity in their homes to invest in apartment conversions in New York and China, earning fees for itself and enough to pay back the mortgages. Best of all, the homeowners could stay in their homes.

These homeowners were just plain greedy as well as stupid. I can't feel even slightly sorry for them. Anyone falling for promises so outrageous deserves a sharp lesson. Not that the scam artists should be allowed to go skipping off into the sunset! They go to prison. And then both can be held up as a sordid lesson in how to not get ripped off.

But how different is this from our economy today? How many hedge funds and stock market player are using 'leverage' which means 'loans' to gamble? One can buy buildings and renovate them and earn huge profits. But why would someone come to another person and offer these profits? How silly. If one has the ability to make money turning around buildings, banks are more than happy to loan money at good rates! So one can get a loan at 6.50% and then turn a building around from $50,000, spend $80,000 fixing it and selling it for $300,000, then one keeps the difference except for Uncle Sam's cut. Why pay off someone else's mortgage with the profits? That would be very stupid.

So it is obvious, if one thinks for a minute, it has to be a scam! During my life, I have witnessed many scams being peddled. And the shocking part was how many of my aquaintances and even dear friends, would fall for them! Even if I drew graphs and showe how illogical these hopes of easy riches were, people would nod and then, behind my back, go off and do whatever it was. I remember when Ponzi schemes swept into the NY arts community, for example. I was invited to a meeting. I stood up and said, 'Why should I waste my time collecting money from other people? Just give it all to me and then you won't have to worry about it anymore, you are all obviously incapable of taking care of your own finances.' I was, needless to say, kicked out.

My son was invited to a Ponzi scheme. He simply said, 'This is illegal.' This made everyone decide he should be excluded from this golden opportunity.

From AFSCAN Help:

Our Competitors

Our competitors claim they can stop foreclosure... what does that mean?
There are literally hundreds of companies on the Web that claim they can stop foreclosure and save your home. We have developed a detailed database of many of those companies in an attempt to show you what their true intent is and what they will do for you. We are not trying to speak negatively about any company... we just want to illustrate the facts and let you decide if you should use them or AFS.

You can help other users by leaving feedback about these companies if you have dealt with them in the past.

If we indicate a company is a lead generation company, not always but in most cases they typically can't help you. They are selling your lead to the highest bidder.

I think this might be a bonafide financial service. First, they give everyone lots of bad news. Such as, you have to beg the bankers for mercy and then obey them when they force you to make a budget and begin payments including LOSING THE HOUSE ANYWAY. And they also say, everyone needs to pay at least 35% of the overdue money immediately upon the negotiations but most of their clients can't even get 30% so there is more bad news in all that. What amused me is their research into all the other organizations most of which were con jobs! If one wants to know about any company offering aid to people losing their homes, this site is very useful.

Here is one of the con jobs in the article:

U. S. HomeSavers is a divison of iCore Capital Consultants, Inc. a Texas Corporation. We are not a government agency.

The name "iCore" is very important us as it had been around since 1996. That little "i" at the front of iCore is a constant reminder of our commitment to absolute integrity.

The core value of our company is Integrity thus the name, iCore. We respect our clients, our agents and affiliates and abide by the absolute best business and ethical standards to effect a foreclosure prevention solution for you. We strive to work with those that have the same core values to provide the highest level of service possible.

How crappy can you get? 'iCore'? How about 'iCon'. These overgirthed jolly good ole' boys from Texas are a scrubby lot, aren't they? They should all be in prison. But Texas, like many states, allows con men to prey on the poor, the hopless or the simply gullible. Bush scammed people in Texas all his long, pathetic life. And they refused to face the facts many times. It disgusts me, seeing people act so obviously against their own interests.

Click here to see the Equitable Real Estate web page:This is a really cheap page. I remember Citadel, a hedge fund which, incidentally, funds and owns one of these scam artist mortgage stealing organizations, Citadel was boasting about how they would make billions, selling shares in their con artist organization and I went to their homepage for information and it said, 'Under Construction.' Heh.

Tom, one the readers of this news service, sent me an interesting hedge fund story.

From the Telegraph, UK:

A derivative blow-up at the Italian bank Italease has sent tremors through Milan's banking fraternity and exposed the hidden dangers of exotic credit instruments.

The bank has paid off 610 million euros (£419m) in recent days to counter-parties in what amounts to a massive margin call after interest rate rises in Europe caused hedging and derivative losses by clients to mushroom out of control.

The share price has tumbled 9pc so far this week, and is down 64pc since the troubles first began to emerge in April.

"These derivatives were very complex and suddenly turned against us," said Pierantonio Arrighi, the bank's spokesman.

"They started moving in a non-linear way, so the losses were rising exponentially. We were afraid that in the worst case some of our clients would not be able to pay the contracts, so we stepped in to protect them, which means we took over the risk," he said.

Another magical hedge fund hell hound bites the dust. Old Yeller is foaming at the mouth, Ma! So shoot him, Ma orders. I like the 'nonlinear way' explanation. This is fancy talk for, 'It is going DOWN...FAST!' Of course, they don't ever want 'linear' in the first place. This means 'stable' and ergo, not making big, boffo profits.

It is humorus to me that a hell hound is complaining about how complex his stupid games are and how they can turn on him and bite back, hard. Well, DUH. He and his ilk know perfectly well, they are simply gamblers who steal from grannies, cheat the uneducated and swindle the gulllible. And if things go south, they get socked by their own suckers. For if there are no new suckers to cheat, the whole Ponzi scheme collapses.

From the Independent article:

John Raymond, an expert on Italian banks at Credit Sights, said Italease had been seduced by the lure of extra yield.

"They're in a boring and safe business with low margins so they found a way to boost returns, but they did so by doing something too exotic. The potential losses are huge in relation to the bank's capital base of 1.5 billion euros, so this is pretty serious," he said.

Being sober, sane and careful is soooooo BORING. So, being a bunch of stupid idiots, all these smart con men go off and run amock which is why they often don't pass on much wealth to future generations. Indeed, they can destory not just whole economies, they can destroy countries, nay, EMPIRES. And indeed, this is the fate of all empires.

This takes me to another matter dear to my heart: the magic of wealth and the Furies. You see, we can all wish for many things. And what we wish for are really curses. And this is because I suppose the Fates get bored, knowing our futures and the Furies love to have fun which means tormenting people. These dire sisters are very dangerous. And they all know a sure fire way to have tons of amusement of the darker sort. Namely, tempt people with money and wealth.

There is also sex. Helen of Troy and all the adventures of Zeus, for example. This captures the very gods themselves. Do note the Furies and Fates, the Norns, these creatures are not gods or goddesses. They are the very snews of our doom, they are the many faces of Death. Durga Kali dancing on our graves.

They are pitiless. If one wants sympathy, don't go visit these weavers and stalkers of the dark night.

So the guys running the organization were bored with mere riches. They wanted to have everything they touch turn to gold. Disregarding all the poet's tales of what happens next, they went off seeking riskier and riskier money generating schemes and got tangled in the vast spiderweb of the cackling old crones who run our affairs.

And there are other creatures who inhabit the realm of these ancient ladies, things that love to dine on despair and seeing these formerly rich men running about, screaming, is a delight to these creatures. But this is small amusement.

The wailing of Emperors as they rush about, tearing their purple and gold robes, screaming for more money, more help! This delights these deadly little scavangers and vultures. They Watch everything very closely. One might suggest, this is sort of like 'American Idol' only it is 'American Idiot' and is like 'Lost Island' only the lost Island is the Continent of North America. And they love war movies and news stories featuring mangled corpses.

Bloomberg has an exclusive story about the other recent hedge fund pooch who is now being put out of his misery, the Bear Stearns clown:

Cioffi joined Bear Stearns in 1985, selling so-called structured products such as bonds backed by mortgages or other loans. His career would also take him outside Bear Stearns's specialty of home-loan assets and into securities linked to company credit.

He was a pioneer in several areas of structured finance, one of Wall Street's fastest-growing businesses over the past decade, and was responsible for the first offerings of several complex financial products used widely today. One example: principal protected notes, which are mostly backed by mortgages or corporate debt and also make use of non-risky assets to guarantee that investors will get at least their principal back.

The creatures who hang out with the Furies and Fates must be licking their chops with joy. First of all, they are delighted these human hedge funders like to summon them by calling their names. Seeing these magicians fall for some of the stupidest scams in the universe is a great delight for these creatures of the Outer Darkness.

And of course, I saw through these scams from the first day! Week after week, year after year, I strove to explain how these scams worked and why they are bad. And of course, the worst aspect of them was very obvious from day one: they are funnelling too much debt into our economy and are bankrupting not just individuals but all of us! The entire American empire.

And this infuriates me. For several years, people would mock me and say, 'But they are getting very rich and you are not, silly woman.' But I could see not the next year or two years later but rather, can see a whole 5 years ahead! Imagine that! So I could see the end of this scam from day one and as I expected, it is now beginning to unfold.

The stock market is soaring even as our trade deficit rises to the very heavens. Our economy isn't strong, it is dying. Our native auto industries are turning in hideous sales figures this month. Losses all over the place. The Japanese, who are destroying us in the trade game are seeing record profits. The end of the 'Carry Trade' scam is in sight: the end of our industries, our empire. We are going bankrupt. And the Asian bankers are telling us, we don't have to pay the mortgage or even the interest! We can live in our McMansions, free, for one whole year!

More Bloomberg:

The losses wouldn't have been so bad except that Cioffi's investment strategy included liberal use of leverage, or borrowed money, that could be pulled.

Cioffi, who knew such investments well, was bearish on mortgages to borrowers with bad credit or high debt amid a surge in defaults, according to a person familiar with his investment strategy. While his funds had mostly bought high-rated home-loan bonds and high-rated pieces of CDOs, at some point this year they also started to use so-called ABX contracts to bet on defaults of low-rated pieces of subprime bonds.

In other words, he knew perfectly well, he was doing something stupid. But he acted like the proverbial monkey putting its hand into a jar to take out a bannana only it can't take it out because the fist is too big so the monkey is stuck with the jar and starves to death. This is beyond pathetic. If someone is this dumb, they should be put out of their misery.

The article continues:

Such strategies aren't unusual among risk takers looking to exploit cracks in the proficiencies of rating firms or other investors. In part, Cioffi blames the actions of Wall Street firms and other CDO underwriters for at least a temporary derailing of his tactics...

HAHAHA. If any of my dogs were this stupid, I would send it down the hill to chase cars. So, this clown's competitors screwed up his little scheme to 'exploit cracks'? What is this man smoking? Ain't cigarettes!

And this again, is very American. We are in a life and death competition with Japan, China, Russia and Israel. And any other nation! We can't let them scam us. We have to protect our assets and not hand over our deeds, or savings or our children to ANYONE. Especially if they are offering us freebies if we only sign the dotted line.

From Bloomberg:

Toyota Motor Corp. and other Asian automakers captured a record share of U.S. sales in June, consolidating gains against General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. in the world's biggest car market.

Toyota, Honda Motor Co. and Nissan Motor Co. each boosted sales by more than 10 percent to lead the Asians to 42.7 percent of the U.S. market, according to Bloomberg data. U.S. automakers, paced by a surprise 21 percent decline at GM, fell to a record low. Overall industry sales slid 3 percent from June 2006 levels.

I see all sorts of stupid news stories pretending to be concerned about China, worried the Chinese might stumble---meanwhile, we go sailing off the cliff. I read in one paper today, the hedge funds and equity funds both now equal $470 TRILLION which is 7 times bigger than the entire planet's GNP. Think about this. I read elsewhere, it is $533 TRILLION. Which is 8 times the world's entire GNP. This is all very nauseating.

Where did this money come from? It isn't from our trade deficit alone. This is magical money created out of thin air by everyone loaning everyone else everything possible and all this is being rapidly attached to, laid upon and sucking dry, the entire business structure of ALL CAPITALISM.

And this reminds me of the playful Chinese 50 year plan that was set into motion just 25 years ago: to use capitalist tools to bankrupt America. It is moving forwards at an astonishing speed thanks to the Japanese. And the way this works is for everyone to lie about everything. Lies about the gravity of this situation, lies about the security of bonds, lies about the profits expected on pieces of paper that are betting a bunch of dead beats who don't want to look ahead or take proper measures, people who are stupid or lazy or ignorant, expecting this base of chumps to pay up all the money they owe?

Insane! It won't happen. Might as well loan money in a bar to a bunch of drunk Texans. Whoopee.

Culture of Life News Main Page

Comments

[blues]

Elaine -- You sound more and more and more like The Book of the Way, written by Lao Tzu 2500 years ago. Seriously! Do review it!

[DeVaul]

"I Corps" is a military term that refers to the first corps. These men talk and look like they are former soldiers, and they are hoping to attract conservative idiots turned on by the reference to I Corps. The fact that they are sitting in a bar should be a warning to anyone remotely sane that this is a scam.

[blues]

You know 'capitalism' -- whatever the hell that is, seems to have failed colossally. Why did anyone think it was such a brilliant collection of wondrous notions? Some parts of it were pretty good. But many are horrendous. I think you could have been a lady Donald Trump (although much nicer!), except you gave people great value and were not too greedy. So that led to other thoughts...

I went to the local locksmith yesterday to have 'notches' carved on my outer door key, as it looks exactly like the inner door key, and I have had to do tricks to avoid using the wrong one. And it got ridiculous. Sos, I asked the key maker to grind notches in the 'outer' key so I could tell one from other. Meanwhile, I wuz tellin' him about how I knew all these great Rock& Roll bands who worked their asses off, and never got jack shit for all their efforts. I also wove in my perennial gripe about how Ford cars have two-faced keys, so they work no matter which way you insert them. Seems the Ford trolls have a patent clamped on them, and they will never let anyone else use this great time, money, and energy saving idea. An anyway, for a non-wealthy person, holding a patent is the same as having a license to have a headache. Only super-rich entities can afford to enforce patents and copyrights, after all. And I advocated outright abolition of all patents, copyrights, and 'intellectual property' in general. Then we could all get back to real work!!!

But NO, he opined. That would be too much like communism!!! The real argument is that people would cease inventing things and writing songs, novels, etc. Which I know from experience would not actually happen! My Big Blues solution??? Simple! Every three months the government gives everyone over the age of 16 a $150 VOUCHER to be DONATED (and it may be parceled out among recipients) at huge EXHIBITIONS. The exhibitors who could vie for voucher cash would be screened by random public juries. They would be writers reading their works, musicians playing their compositions, inventors showing how their two-sided keys made life a little easier for everyone. Programmers could show off how great their programs were. At the end of the day, the townspeople would bestow their voucher money upon those they thought had contributed the most.

Is this 'communism'? I don't think so. This is giving people the freedom to sing and build and have all manner of useful things! With no Philadelphia lawyers at their door with insane lawsuits. Kids could go to school and not worry about the RIAA sending them huge fines for 'pirating' music! And all the unsung great musicians would get a piece of the Great American Pie!!!

THIS IS WHAT I CALL EQUITALISM!

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It comes in Windows, Linux, and MacOSX image. Get it for free:

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http://www.editpadpro.com/editpadlite.html

http://www.treepad.com

-- They also come in Windows, Linux, and MacOSX image.)

Maybe I will devote my next website (dailytrough.com) to Great Ideas that Will save The World.

[D.F. Facti]

About 7 years ago now I completed a questionnaire for a law firm which had filed a class action against New York Life, a former employer of mine. Although the company had a lot of really good people, the company, like most of the old time life insurance companies, had changed from a company in the business of insuring risks to a bond manager primarily. Profits from trades and bond immunization programs, etc. outstripped revenue from life insurance (and other) premium income by a very significant percentage.

There was this seething resentment on the part of the people running the investment department - of which I was a part - against all the Wall Street salesmen and traders and investment bankers who were pulling down 7-figure incomes - including investment managers working for a subsidiary the company had acquired. The whole company turned into a career enhancement laboratory for a handful, as a result. At first it was sort of fun to be part of the "break away" movement - but when I had the misfortne to have to go up against the new wave - I was told, "You're taking this too seriously. It's just a game." (I had a big name client that was unhappy. "CLIENTS? Who CARES?" was the reigning sentiment.)

In the questionnaire I said that the Wall Street milieu had become a universe of greedy, greedier, greediest. All of those "quants" from Wharton and Chicago and Stanford - and the whiz kids from Harvard - companies were mesmerized and intimidated to a certain extent by all that so-called expertise - which was nothing more than a giant Ponzi scheme, as you often have observed.

I could see it - not in the terms you do - but it was obvious that there was something very wrong going back 20 years now.

No one gave a shit about the BUSINESS. It was all about funny money.

Those people will all survive. They'll grind people like me to a pulp if necessary to do so, though. Too bad I didn't know you then!

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

Hi, Facti. I can be ruthless but only on a small scale. The other day, my husband and I saw a baby robin fall from its nest and it ran into the street. We stopped and searched for its nest while the parent birds flew about us. Finally, I found it in an old apple tree. Baby was put home again.

And so it is: the world can be a cruel place. We shouldn't be cruel because of this.

[Judah]

From my own examination of economics and energy, it seems the current trend is creating false wealth with no long-term value. I'm getting out of the stock market this summer, and getting Yuan. I agree with your analysis; as soon as Hubbert peak (which we are at) tapers off, the world will be changing and the wealth on paper will evaporate. Bad times coming in the USA; I wish we had actually invested in mag-lev trains when we created them in 1960's. Instead, Japan developed the tech after America decided it no longer needed a rail network because we had planes and cars and trucks.

Keep up the good work Elaine.

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

I love trains. One hobby of mine has been 'train spotting.' Some of the Monty Python crew do this too. The history of trains is most fascinating and I have actually gotten a ride in the cab of a really big steam engine while in Europe.

I look at the foreign trains being built today with a lot of envy and despair. I live right next to where trains used to run in NY 50 years ago.

And going to and from NYC would be infinitely easier if we had maglev trains in the NE Amtrak corridor!