BUSTED: Dozens More Fannie Mae Employees Got 'Sweetheart Mortgages' Via Countrywide's VIP Program
WASHINGTON — The former Countrywide Financial Corp. gave preferential loans to more than three dozen employees of Fannie Mae while the two giant housing enterprises were locked in an expanding, multi-billion dollar business relationship in subprime mortgages, documents show.
Discounted mortgages written by Countrywide, once the nation's largest subprime lender, were granted to a far wider group of Fannie employees than the four top executives executives whose preferential loans were previously disclosed, according to Countrywide documents provided to Congress under a subpoena.
Countrywide's VIP section, established to handle preferential mortgages for favored customers, serviced a variety of Fannie employees who handled Fannie's business of buying mortgages and selling mortgage-backed bonds. Recipients included an account manager, a lobbyist, underwriters, lawyers, a home loan manager, a sales executive and a credit risk manager.
The documents reveal that when Countrywide was depending on government-sponsored firms to finance billions of dollars worth of subprime loans that touched off the housing meltdown, it was giving employees at the largest of those companies – Fannie Mae – sweetheart deals on their own home loans.
Countrywide was acquired by Bank of America in mid-2008. The documents were turned over to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee by Bank of America. The government seized control of Fannie Mae and its smaller government-sponsored competitor, Freddie Mac, in September 2008. So far, the takeover has cost taxpayers $145 billion and is likely to be the most expensive of all the financial bailouts.
Rep. Darrell Issa of California, the House committee's senior Republican, said Countrywide's preferential VIP mortgages for Fannie employees spiked in 1998, when Countrywide was negotiating volume discounts on the subprime mortgages it was selling, and again from 2001 to 2003, at the edge of a housing and mortgage boom.
In a letter to the Federal Housing Finance Agency – the government agency that regulates Fannie Mae and a smaller competitor, Freddie Mac – Issa said Countrywide's 153 loans to 37 Fannie employees were part of a attempt to vastly expand business with Fannie to the detriment of Freddie. Though government-chartered institutions, both Fannie and Freddie were owned by private stockholders.
"In 1999, Countrywide reached an exclusive agreement to sell Fannie Mae billions of dollars in mortgages at a discounted rate," Issa said in the letter.
Records compiled by a trade publication, Inside Mortgage Finance, show Fannie rapidly expanding its purchases of Countrywide mortgages and a decline in sales of them to Freddie.
Jul 21, 2010 at 12:09 PM
Reader Comments (47)
Shocked by past deals with Italy and Greece, governments are excluding the Wall Street bank from sovereign bond sales
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/jul/18/goldman-sachs-europe-sovereign-bond-sales
"French people would riot in the streets if we chose Goldman," said a person familiar with the French treasury.
He added, "Obama is a master of rhetoric. He is a master of deceptive language. And any white candidate who runs against him will be up against the race card. I take the race card off the table."
Cain, a devout Christian, emphasized he is "prayerfully considering" a 2012 bid for the GOP nomination.
http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=181961
This guy would drive you crazy DB (the God stuff) but he would be a great addition to politics.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wP4YL9vhPuc
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0710/40072.html
More than 13 months ago, I wrote a column that began: “Sarah Palin can be the Republican nominee in 2012. I am not saying she will be, but she can be. Those who underestimate her do so at their own risk.”
Don't worry DB, this article is Politico so it is the agenda is to encourage Palin to run but the article is not talking up Palin.
Politico goes on to say...Making fun of President Obama, Palin asked the crowd: “How’s that hope-y, change-y stuff working out for you?”
She believed what the crowd believed: It wasn’t working out very well.
Maybe she wrote those lines on her palm; I don’t know. But I don’t think the crowd cared, especially when Palin said: “This is about the people, and it’s bigger than any one king or queen of a tea party, and it’s a lot bigger than any charismatic guy with a teleprompter.”
I just want to see Palin debate Obama...
Sarah..."Hey, can I call you Barry?"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nb_78CRHw9Q
Mel Gibson - Oksana / Michael Savage/ We support Mel Gibson - July 2010 "Oksana-Gate"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RoBEdkZc5M0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69RA-kJ1JYo
Sen. John Kerry, who has repeatedly voted to raise taxes while in Congress, dodged a whopping six-figure state tax bill on his new multimillion-dollar yacht by mooring her in Newport, R.I.
http://bostonherald.com/track/inside_track/view.bg?articleid=1269698
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lClaQLsBb-4
Great Advert...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbdzMLk9wHQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLuMWiQ6r2o
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86-or9XrUl0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRUbwnkEPqc&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yS4yf723kmY&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zISKoQegbxM
Hmmmm, old news but then again, who did you vote for?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KuvRRPq-AtY
Why do you think the Republicans lost control of Congress and the Presidency? Don't look on your talking points memo, the answer is not there.
They lost control because the minority "majority" (remember, the majority do not vote) of voters grew tired of lies, lack of fiscal responsibility, scandals, and a general disregard for following the will of their bosses (the American people).
The Dems will lose control soon for the same reasons, and then the process will repeat itself again as it has for the past 150 years. It never has anything to really do with with the candidates, they were bought and paid for years ago, and everyone knows the Republicans will vote Republican, the Democrats will vote Democrat, so the real decider of elections is the swing voters, since the non voting majority remains detached (and that is why the contributors finance both sides, because swing voters have been proven to be fickle, and difficult to control, while herdists are pleasantly simple to control) .
Swing voters vote mainly because they are tired of the same old shit listed above, and have not figured out there might actually be another way besides playing ping pong by merely changing parties in charge over, and over, and over again.
You know, the algae is always greener on the cesspool next to you, but as you climb over from the nasty one you were just in and muck it up real good, you realize it is just as brown and shitty smelling as the one you just left...
Since you do fixate on Chicago so much, this one is for you;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-oK1hBq467E&feature=related
The majority could rule, if they would quit saying " ah, my vote don't matter", and watching dancing with the stars, etc..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCC0OaU8ndA&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yS4yf723kmY&feature=related
I guess you don't like Elvis and Cartman?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1eFdUSnaQM&feature=fvw
"This one was mine..."
Are you speaking to us from the grave Ernest? John Kerry is also bought, don't you see that?
You on the other hand, still believe in unicorns.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1sRbecLxR8&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-84V_aWXNS0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2S60N2W5xzk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeKNH57dTec
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54XtPnPkc_Y
They don't care that he's half white or half black.
"A blind man cannot guide a blind man, can he? Will they not both fall into a pit? A pupil is not above his teacher; but everyone, after he has been fully trained, will be like his teacher. And why do you look at the speck that is in you brother's eye but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Of how can you say to your brother, 'Brother, let me take out the speck that is in your eye,' when you yourself do not see the log that is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take out the speck that is in your brother's eye. "
For someone who considers the godless Alinsky and Nietchze to be superior, it is a kick in the pants to watch him struggle with the Bible. Those three books together in the same place, it is amazing that spontaneous combustion has not occurred...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FIAkcjMPVlQ&feature=player_embedded#!
Ellen mcilwaine/We The People
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Z6Rc5r9y80&feature=related
Rising Tyranny - GRV Music
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCeyEeNbMn4
WOW Music Video (Papa Roach "Tyranny of Normality")
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=injUI7PykrE
That is because you have never read Bertrand Russell's book, A History of Western Philosophy. When you have, let me know. Until then, I will forgive your ignorance and continue to pity you.
I am doing fine, there are many more that need it Gobie, but you would rather walk on their backs.
----------------
Outstanding comment gomp...
The problems are really very simple, it is the solutions that become complex.
RLR,
His idea of pity is running out of cheeto's before the porno has ended. Hence even his "pity" is about himself as he commands the starship Enterprise from one dangerous mission to the next...