It’s a sad fact of life, but unscrupulous vultures are always ready to pick at the flesh of the most financially distressed–which more frequently these days includes the owners of luxury real estate.
Over on our San Diego real estate blog we report that San Diego County District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis is asking San Diego Realtors to help her track down and prosecute real estate fraudsters operating in our county.
We have written before about the foreclosure and loan modification scams that prey upon distressed San Diego home owners who are struggling to stay in their homes. The DA’s office is aggressively trying to warn homeowners to stay away from these San Diego real estate crooks and their fraudulent offers of mortgage and loan modification assistance–and is asking us, as San Diego Realtors, to report any suspicious activity.
All too often, unwitting and desperate home owners will pay an upfront fee to a person or company who promises to prevent foreclosure–or to modify existing mortgage loan terms. And all too often, people are paying for services they never receive–and might be better off with a do-it-yourself loan modification.
It’s bad enough that there’s scams everywhere, even in real estate. It’s even scarier to know that even those who own luxury homes are being scammed as well. I hope that the recent federal plans to stamp out fraud will succeed.
I find that in all my years in real estate the luxury end of the market was always more ripe for fraud. There are many con artists coming out of the wood work to prey on those that are clinging on to hope. “If it sounds too good to be true…”
I found your blog on google and read this great post on loan modification. I just added this site to my Google News Reader. I Look forward to reading more here in the future.