One Stolen Wallet = Three Attempted "Home Equity Thefts"

http://HomeEquityTheft.blogspot.com
Anyone interested in knowing how one stolen wallet in a crowded bar can lead to the victimization of its owner, three Chicago property owners, and three mortgage companies should read this January, 2006 story reported in the Chicago Tribune Online Edition at chicagotribune.com.

In a nutshell, a stolen wallet and its contents ended up in the hands of fraudsters. After assuming the identity of the wallet's owner, they went out and obtained mortgages on three Chicago properties they didn't own, unbeknownst to the true owners of each property.

Each of the three properties ended up with phony mortgages on them. Reportedly,

• one property owner was able to save her property and clear her property title and straighten out her mess, but declined to say how much it cost her to do so,

• another property owner was able to forestall a foreclosure sale involving the phony mortgage on his property, but couldn't sell or borrow against it because the mortgage company hasn't released the phony mortgage,

• a third property owner (for undisclosed reasons) never appeared in the foreclosure action brought by the company holding the phony mortgage on his property; the property (as of the date of the media report) was headed for a foreclosure sale.

Despite the fact that the wallet's owner immediately reported the incident, the incident has cost her a perfect credit rating and her parents about $10,000 in legal bills in fending off the claims from the three mortgage companies (who were also scam victims; reportedly, the wallet's owner got little help from the law enforcement agencies that she met with).