Mortgage Broker

At long last, HARP 2.0 is available to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac borrowers who want to refinance but owe more on their mortgages than their houses now are worth. HARP 2.0 - HARP stands for Home Affordable Refinance Program - is being billed as an improvement over the three-year-old version that just about everyone acknowledges didn't help anyone. The reason for that failure: The original program had limits on loan-to-value ratio, the amount of a mortgage as a percentage of the appraised value of a property.

A Lafayette Hill couple has filed suit against Lomas & Nettleton Co., the nation's second-largest mortgage company, alleging fraud, breach of contract and racketeering after the company "refused" to process their application for a mortgage with an agreed-upon interest rate. The suit, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia, accuses Lomas & Nettleton of persuading Mario and Jan Zacharjasz of Lafayette Hill to pay hundreds of dollars in fees and other payments to "lock in" a mortgage rate that the company knew was not available.

A South Philadelphia mortgage broker charged with a murder-for-hire plot was sentenced yesterday to more than 12 years in federal prison for a separate mortgage-fraud scheme. Mahn Huu "Bruce" Doan, 40, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Michael M. Baylson to 151 months in prison and was ordered to pay more than $5 million in restitution. Doan oversaw 195 fraudulent real estate transactions involving about 180 properties, financed with government-insured loans he obtained by using borrowed or fictitious identities, prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum.

We are trying to refinance our house. But I think we made a bad mistake by going to a mortgage broker. She told us she represents 12 different lenders and would have no trouble getting us an 80 percent mortgage. We were charged $250 for the appraisal but, when I asked for a copy, were told, "That's confidential information. " When I threatened to take her to small-claims court, two days later, I got a copy of the appraisal. We applied for the new mortgage in late April and still don't have the loan.

We just got swindled by a mortgage broker and are wondering if you think we should sue for damages. In March, our bid to buy a home was accepted by the seller, and we had 45 days to close the purchase. The real estate agent said this would be plenty of time, since she knew a good mortgage broker. Within a few days we completed the mortgage-application forms. The mortgage broker said he had a $5 million mortgage commitment to lend at 9.25 percent fixed interest. But the appraiser hired by the mortgage broker took forever to complete the appraisal, even though he inspected the house within a week.

Last winter, Rick and Denise Mariano of Northeast Philadelphia figured they'd board the bandwagon by refinancing the mortgage on their big twin home with the oak molding and the nine-foot ceilings. They settled on a mortgage broker in Bucks County that was offering "the lowest (rate) or pretty close to it," Rick said last night, and plunked down $400 to lock in the rate until settlement 60 days later. The 60 days turned into 90 days, and then somebody unlocked the rate on them.

A South Philadelphia mortgage broker was ordered held without bail yesterday on murder-for-hire charges as prosecutors revealed that the man he allegedly attempted to hire was a cooperating federal witness who secretly recorded several conversations in which the murder plot was discussed. "Make it look like a robbery," Mahn Huu "Bruce" Doan said, according to a partial transcript in a pretrial motion filed by Assistant U.S. Attorney Christine E. Sykes. "Do whatever you think is best in your mind where it don't bring back heat," Doan allegedly added during the conversation recorded May 1 at his business office in the Econo Lodge Airport Hotel in South Philadelphia.

A mortgage broker was appointed last night as the newest member of the Township Council. Joseph P. McCrea, 35, an assistant vice president at Countrywide Home Loans in Sewell, filled the seat vacated by Democrat Raymond J. Rapposelli. He will serve the 10 months left in Rapposelli's four-year term and, he said, will campaign in the June primary for a spot on the Democratic council ticket for the November election. McCrea said last night that his real estate experience would help with Washington Township's open-space acquisition program.

Man guilty in fatal stabbing A Camden man was convicted yesterday of killing a girlfriend with whom he had two children. Ernest Lawrence, 29, was arrested for the stabbing death of Jennifer Lane, 19, on Jan. 8, 2008. Prosecutors said he stabbed and slashed her 17 times. He allegedly stabbed himself and then said Lane attacked him. After being released from the hospital he tried to flee to Jamaica but was arrested before he was able to, prosecutors said. He could receive life in prison when he's sentenced Nov. 19. Man shot in Chester bar Two men walked into Bill's Tavern on 3rd Street near Thurlow, Chester, Monday afternoon and opened fire, critically injuring a 35-year-old man, according to police.

The owner of Invictus Financial Group in Havertown was sentenced to 60 months in prison and ordered to pay restitution of $3.9 million for operating a real estate investment scheme that caused $6 million in losses to lenders, the U.S. Attorney's Office in Philadelphia said. Kirk H. Kirby, of Capital Heights, Md., pretended to be a licensed mortgage broker and ran what the government said was similar to a Ponzi scheme in 2006 and 2007. An accomplice, Sholanda Y. Johnson, of Philadelphia, was sentenced to 30 months and ordered to pay back $2.4 million.

The U.S. attorney in Philadelphia charged Michael J. Smith, of Springfield, Delaware County, with participation in mortgage fraud that caused losses of $665,000 to lenders. Smith, a former mortgage broker, allegedly participated in a conspiracy with John C. Lucidi Jr. and Eric Maratea, both of whom are charged elsewhere, in a scheme to buy properties, mostly at the Jersey Shore, at inflated prices so that buyers could receive kickbacks of tens of thousands of dollars. Smith was one of the buyers, according to the four-count indictment.

At long last, HARP 2.0 is available to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac borrowers who want to refinance but owe more on their mortgages than their houses now are worth. HARP 2.0 - HARP stands for Home Affordable Refinance Program - is being billed as an improvement over the three-year-old version that just about everyone acknowledges didn't help anyone. The reason for that failure: The original program had limits on loan-to-value ratio, the amount of a mortgage as a percentage of the appraised value of a property.

Certain rules about managing money are fairly obvious, and among the most basic is this one: "Don't get in over your head. " But things that seem like a good idea at the time - buying a house, for instance - can go horribly wrong. For evidence of that, just look at the last six years of record foreclosures in this country, which can be attributed to factors as diverse as folks being duped into taking on bigger mortgages than they could afford and to the waves of layoffs announced during and after the Great Recession.

A Berks County judge ordered six former employees of a jailed mortgage broker to pay restitution of nearly $1.5 million to victims, mostly in Lancaster and Berks Counties, of a $28 million fraud from 2003 through September 2007. But the state Attorney General's Office, which filed the 2008 consumer-protection lawsuit against Wesley A. Snyder and his Berks County companies that resulted in this month's judgment, responded Friday with a posttrial motion asking Common Pleas Court Judge Albert A. Stallone to enter far larger judgments against the employees.

A former television evangelist who served prison time before starting a church in Chester County was charged Thursday by federal authorities with engaging in a $6.4 million mortgage-fraud scheme. Michael Wilkerson, 45, is pastor of the New Millennium Life Restoration Fellowship, with centers in Spring City and Phoenixville. He also owned the Agape Development Co., which said it developed real estate. According to an indictment returned Thursday, Wilkerson recruited several church members and their families to act as "straw" purchasers of houses in Schwenksville and Glenmoore.

Federal authorities charged a Montgomery County pastor and three others in an alleged $6.4 million mortgage fraud. The U.S. Attorney's office in Philadelphia said Thursday that Michael Wilkerson recruited at least five congregants of his New Millenium Life Restoration Fellowship, with locations in Phoenixville and Spring City, to act as straw buyers, who were paid $15,000 to participate in the scheme December 2006 to about August 2008....

In the Region Guilty plea entered in mortgage fraud John C. Lucidi Jr., a former mortgage broker for companies in West Chester and Newtown Square, pleaded guilty to a mortgage fraud that cost banks more than $7 million between May 2005 and October 2008, Zane David Memeger, United States attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, said Thursday. Lucidi, 30, of Las Vegas, allegedly found buyers for houses at inflated prices, helped them qualify for mortgages by supplying false information to lenders, and gave the buyers kickbacks at closing, typically between $30,000 and $50,000, prosecutors said.

Mortgage fraud alleged John C. Lucidi Jr., 30, of Las Vegas, who once worked in West Chester, was charged by the U.S. Attorney's Office yesterday in a $7-million mortgage scheme to defraud seven financial institutions. Authorities said Lucidi, who formerly worked as a mortgage broker for companies in West Chester and Newtown Square, found buyers, some of them family members, to buy homes - primarily in North Wildwood - for inflated prices in exchange for kickbacks of between $30,000 and $50,000 at closing.

A Las Vegas man who once worked in West Chester was charged today by the U.S. Attorney here in a $7-million mortgage fraud scheme. Authorities said John C. Lucidi Jr., 30, who formerly worked as a mortgage broker for companies in West Chester and Newtown Square, defrauded at least seven financial institutions as part of a scheme that lasted from May 2005 to October 2008. The court filing alleged that Lucidi found buyers, including family members, to purchase homes-primarily located in North Wildwood for inflated prices so that buyers could get kickbacks of of between $30,000 and $50,000 at closing.