NC AG's Efforts Lead To Shutdown Of Loan Modification Racket For Allegedly Clipping Homeowners For Upfront Fees, Failing To Providing Meaningful Help

From the Office of the North Carolina Attorney General:

• A Charlotte loan modification company that claimed to help people lower their mortgage payments and save their homes from foreclosure but actually did little or nothing to help them is permanently out of business in North Carolina, Attorney General Roy Cooper announced [].

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• Cooper filed suit in September 2012 against Lender Exchange for charging consumers illegal advance fees for mortgage loan modification services and then failing to provide them with meaningful help. Under North Carolina law, it’s illegal to charge an upfront fee for foreclosure assistance or loan modification services.
  
  Wake County Superior Court Judge Donald Stephens signed off on a consent judgment which permanently bans Lender Exchange and its owners, Kenneth Carl McCurd and Tanya Louisa Wilson, from conducting any loan modification, foreclosure assistance or debt relief services in the state. The owners will also pay refunds of $4,000 to consumers who complained to Cooper’s office about their company. If the defendants violate the judgment, they will have to pay an additional $58,000.
  
  According to Cooper’s complaint, Lender Exchange falsely claimed that no homeowner who used its services had ever lost their home to foreclosure and promised prospective customers a full refund if it wasn’t able to obtain a loan modification for them. However, homeowners who paid Lender Exchange its fee of one month’s mortgage payment and did not get meaningful help have had a hard time getting their money back.
  

For the North Carolina AG press release, see Charlotte loan modification business shuttered, AG Cooper says.