An unlicensed mortgage loan broker faces up to 30 yrs in jail soon after pleading guilty to a fraud scheme in which $4.74 million in property finance loan refinancing proceeds had been allegedly wired to accounts controlled by the perpetrators.

The scheme remaining victims with two mortgages on their households, and several have been finally foreclosed on. Dwelling Level Economical Corp., loanDepot, United Wholesale House loan and other wholesale home loan loan companies in the long run dropped $2.47 million in the scheme, in accordance to a felony info submitted by prosecutors.

Brent Kaufman, 50, of Commack, New York, pled guilty on Aug. 31 at the federal courthouse in Brooklyn, for a scheme that authorities stated was active from close to 2016 to 2019. Kaufman worked as an unlicensed mortgage broker, “and typically assisted customers in Queens and Very long Island with refinancing their mortgages,” prosecutors mentioned.

Kaufman and some others not named in the complaint allegedly carried out the scheme by giving incorrect wire routing information and facts to refinancing loan providers. As an alternative sending cash to the monetary institutions keeping the home loans to be refinanced, the refinancing creditors despatched the funds to accounts controlled by Kaufman.

So the original home loans weren’t paid off ideal absent, though Kaufman used some of the proceeds to preserve making month to month payments or sooner or later spend them off “to keep away from detection of his plan,” prosecutors explained.

“Not only did Kaufman steal his victims’ funds, but he also violated their have faith in, leaving them economically vulnerable and at possibility of major financial complications,” reported FBI Assistant Director-in-Demand Michael J. Driscoll, in a statement.

In addition to the FBI’s New York Industry Workplace, investigators involved the Federal Housing Finance Company, Place of work of Inspector Standard (FHFA-OIG) and the United States Postal Inspection Company, New York Division (USPIS).

The circumstance is staying prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s Business office for the Jap District of New York, which covers Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island, as properly as Nassau and Suffolk counties. In addition to possible jail time, Kaufman faces a high-quality of up to $1 million when he’s sentenced, and forfeiture of any unwell-gotten gains, prosecutors reported.

In the course of the second quarter of 2021, the CoreLogic National Mortgage Software Fraud Hazard Index was up 37.2 p.c from a calendar year in the past, to 132. At the top of the pandemic refinancing increase, the index dropped to 96 “due to the inflow of reduced-threat charge/expression refinances. The increase back again to 132 for Q2 2021 is on the historically high conclude of the index, but is not trigger for terrific concern,” due to the change in quantity towards riskier order financial loans, CoreLogic documented.

The New York-Newark-Jersey City metro region experienced the sixth-optimum possibility of home finance loan fraud for the duration of the second quarter of 2021. Among the prime 15 marketplaces with the highest danger of fraud, six ended up in Florida.

Best 15 markets with the highest possibility of home loan fraud

1. Las Vegas-Henderson-Paradise, Nevada (251)
2. Miami-Fort Lauderdale-Pompano Seashore, Florida (235)
3. Poughkeepsie-Newburgh-Middletown, New York (206)
4. Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, Florida (191)
5. San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, California (189)
6. New York-Newark-Jersey City, N.Y.-N.J.-Penn. (186)
7. Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford, Florida (180)
8. Cape Coral-Fort Myers, Florida (180)
9. North Port-Sarasota-Bradenton, Florida (178)
10. L.A.-Extensive Seashore-Anaheim, California (176)
11. San Francisco-Oakland-Berkeley, California (171)
12. McAllen-Edinburg-Mission, Texas (169)
13. Columbia, South Carolina (166)
14. Bridgeport-Stamford-Norwalk, Connecticut (160)
15. Lakeland-Winter season Haven, Florida (158)

Source: CoreLogic

E mail Matt Carter