President Obama has signed a new Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection into law, but he will take some time before deciding who will lead it.

“I do not expect an imminent announcement on that,” said White House spokesman Robert Gibbs.

Lawmakers who backed the new Wall Street regulation bill are touting Elizabeth Warren, the former Harvard law professor who came up with the idea of the consumer protection board in the first place.

Others wonder if Warren can win Senate confirmation. “There’s a serious question about it,” said Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., who helped write the new financial regulations, speaking on NPR.

Some conservatives say Warren — who currently chairs a federal bailout watchdog committee — may be too anti-business. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., declined to comment on Warren’s confirmation prospects, saying he will wait to see who Obama nominates.

“If it had been up to me, we wouldn’t have created that agency in the first place,” McConnell said. “It will be a massive bureaucracy.”

Gibbs said Warren is one of the names under consideration.

After all, the new bureau is something that Warren “thought should be put in place to ensure that consumers were on equal footing with big banks,” Gibbs said, adding that she would be “a terrific nominee.”

“I have seen comments by those that questioned whether she could be confirmed,” Gibbs said. “And I don’t agree with those at all.”

With foreclosure sales steadily rising, four states are concerned that the use of the foreclosure sale prices in appraisals of neighboring homes is distorting the market.

Legislators in Illinois, Nevada, and Missouri have all proposed separate bills that would exclude or restrict foreclosure sales from being used as comparisons to determine the value of homes around them.

Maryland had proposed a similar bill, but withdrew the legislation on Tuesday.

Industry participants have expressed reservation at the idea of barring distressed sales from consideration when appraising properties, saying such actions would cause homes to be appraised for more than they are really worth.

According to the Appraisal Institute, “Elimination of foreclosures and short sales as comparables would result in an artificial market and would mislead lenders as to the true value of their mortgage collateral.”

Furthermore, the institute notes that under the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice, all federally related transactions are required to consider all sales for appraisals, including short sales and other distressed sales. Most residential lending transactions fall into this category.

“In some markets, there are so many distressed sales that they are the market and must be considered. When there is a glut of distress sales in the marketplace, and those properties are truly comparable to the subject, it would be misleading not to use them as part, or in some cases all, of the basis for a value conclusion,” a representative of the institute said in an e-ma

via dsnews.com

Posted via email from Title Insurance
Continuing Ed for Title Agents

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MERS Knew of Their Own Foreclosure Defects in 2006 | The Big Picture

February 23, 2011 admin

Evidence shows that as far back as 2006, Mortgage Electronic Registration System (“MERS”) knew the legality regarding foreclosures was at best tenuous. As you can see, the First American Agent Bulletin memo informed agents and lawyers that MERS.

I posted the full memo in the Think Tank, but the short version is:

• MERs admits it is not the Owner & Holder of the Note

• The Note must be in members’ possession to foreclose in MERs name

• Members could not conduct foreclosures in the name of MERS in Florida.

I find it intriguing that for at least 5 years, and probably a whole lot longer, MERS was aware that their legal fiction was starting to unravel . . .

via ritholtz.com

Posted via email from Title Insurance
Continuing Ed for Title Agents