Guard Against Identity Theft - Read The Fine Print - Keep All Documents

There is rampant Identity Theft happening in the United States.  Apparently, crooks are able to steal someone's identity to take out presumably a second mortgage against the home.  Once they get the money, they are long gone.  The Homeowner may not even be aware that there is a second mortgage on the home with another lender until they start getting delinquent payment notices from the lender.  If the payments are not made, it could lead to foreclosure, which would be a nightmare scenario.  There are security firms people can retain to help prevent something like this from happening.  These companies monitor any potential change in title, which might prevent the theft from happening.  

In a case we encountered just today, one of our past customers had obtained a loan with our assistance from one of the major banks.  Sometime later, they decided to refinance the mortgage again with our assistance because interest rates had dropped.  In the process, the initial mortgage on the home was paid off by the new lender.  However, the pay off apparently never got recorded.  The good news is that the initial lender did send a lender indicating that the pay off had occurred.  And, the customer still has the original loan number.  This is all coming up because this couple is selling their home and the encumbrance related to the initial mortgage is still listed on title.  This one is an easy fix.  Either the title company that closed the deal needs to record the loan as paid off and or the mortgage company just needs to record the pay off.  This was a simple error that should be resolved quickly.

What is important is that this transaction took place in 2015.  The couple kept all documents so it should be very easy to get this cloud on title removed so that they can close the sale with their buyers.  The lesson here is read the fine print and keep all documents for many years.  In this case, the problem has come up 6 years later.  The most important thing is that the initial mortgage was paid off at the closing table so this money is not floating around somewhere in somebody else's hands.  Sadly, we live in a world full of crooks.  We can't be too careful.  Never give out Social Security numbers or a Driver's License number over the phone to anybody, or company you don't know.   

Scams are happening every day.  One that occurs shows your computer locked up and requires you to call Microsoft, which is not Microsoft; but rather scammers.  They require you to give them your password to open up your computer.  Never, Never do it.  They are attempting to get into your computer to steal any information that may be of value to them.  They are crooks.