Your Mortgage: Financing Your Home Without Falling for Fraud with Marie McDonnell

Entering into a home mortgage is a major legal and financial undertaking. It quite literally “pays” to take the time to understand your options and ensure that the application and closing process is done correctly. After closing, it is essential that you ensure that the terms and conditions that were agreed to are maintained and enforced. It will be your responsibility to make sure this is the case.

To help you do so, I invited Marie McDonnell, President of McDonnell Property Analytics, to join me this week on the Solari Report. Marie is a Mortgage Fraud and Forensic Analyst™, a Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE), and a Master Analyst In Financial Forensics (MAFF) with significant experience in transactional analysis, mortgage auditing, and mortgage fraud investigation. Her firm provides a variety of analytical services to individual clients and offers litigation support, mortgage-backed securities research and foreclosure forensics to attorneys nationwide. McDonnell Property Analytics also advises and performs services for county registers of deeds, attorneys general, courts and other governmental agencies.

Because mortgage finance is a complex affair, Marie has generously prepared and provided supporting documents. Please login to find handouts, including:

The Mortgage Loan Origination Process and Pitfalls How to Recognize the Red Flags of Fraud
Document Custodian Checklist
Glossary of Terms

One point you will hear emphasized repeatedly – it is essential that you understand the documents that you are supposed to have and that you sign and that you maintain all copies. Unfortunately, horror stories of what can go wrong abound. However, if you take care to manage your origination, closing and payment of your mortgage and do a good job of archiving your documents, you should be able to avoid potential pitfalls or present your proof if things go wrong outside of your control – such as your mortgage being transferred to a sloppy or fraudulent servicer.

Marie McDonnell is our Solari hero this week. She and I have been in communication for more than a year in the hope that she could join me on the Solari Report. It takes hard work, intelligence and grit to represent consumers in the mortgage process and mortgage litigation – courage too!