Foreclosure ruling leaves buyers in limbo

[n2doc]

By Erin Ailworth
Globe Staff / October 19, 2011
The state’s highest court added further turmoil to the housing market yesterday when it ruled that buyers of some foreclosed homes may not be the legal owners of those properties.


The decision leaves in limbo hundreds, if not thousands, of people who bought homes seized by lenders under questionable circumstances. They are left with no easy recourse; among their options are to sue the lender behind the botched foreclosure or “reforeclose’’ on the prior owner.

“It leaves us nowhere,’’ said Edward M. Bloom, president of the Real Estate Bar Association for Massachusetts. “The residential housing market is never going to stabilize and grow until all of these properties that are in foreclosure are organized and cleaned out.’’

This is the second ruling in less than a year in which the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has tried to sort out the mess created by the rapid-fire foreclosure of thousands of properties after the housing market’s collapse. During that time, some lenders seized and then resold homes before establishing a clear record of ownership. Last winter, the high court upheld a contentious ruling from the Massachusetts Land Court that challenged how banks had traditionally seized properties without having all the necessary paperwork.

In that case the high court overturned foreclosures of two properties in Springfield by U.S. Bancorp and Wells Fargo after the banks could not prove they owned the mortgages they foreclosed on.

http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2011/10/19/sjc_puts_foreclosure_sales_in_doubt/?p1=News_links

Buyers of stolen property don't get to keep it, even if they didn't know it was stolen.

[dtexdem]

1. The banksters' messes always hurt somebody else.

Buyers who buy with assurances, a la title searches, should be fully compensated, then both the victimized buyers and the victimized foreclosees should get punitive damages from the bankster perpetrators.

[gratuitous]

2. Inevitable

And now, people trying to buy homes have to go through the process of trying to establish a clean title to properties fucked up by sharp operators who are long gone, having pocketed their commissions and skedaddled without attending to the paperwork. Naturally, nobody can figure out who is responsible, so buyers, courts, attorneys and county recorders are left holding the bag, causing wholly unneccessary and avoidable delay and expense.

But we can't clamp down on an out-of-control system and impose regulations with some teeth, because that would cost too much money! How much money is it going to cost to clean up Big Shitpile, and why aren't the folks who caused this mess paying to clean it up?

[DCKit]

3. +1, else I'd be the dispossessed owner of a forclosure.

Instead, I sit here in the place I bought cheap nineteen years ago.

Again with the lament "Who could POSSIBLY have seen this coming?"

[Supersedeas]

4. the Bankers, Appraisers, and Realtors got theirs prior to foreclosure

many of them knowing that the market prices were seriously seriously overvalued.

the Bankers got their origination fees, and the proceeds from foreclosure.

the Appraisers collected their checks

the Realtors collected their percentage on the sales price

and they must be laughing at the mess that they left behind for someone else to clean-up