Misleading Subprime Advertising
This is a very official looking document we received in February, offering us the opportunity to refinance our mortgage and pull out nearly 300,000. Be sure you click on the thumbnail and look at the larger version. It gives official-looking legal citations, numbering, and even a government-looking seal on it.
I’m sure we landed on a list for this as a result of our required applications for grant and scholarship funding for our middle son. Whatever the reason, see if you can find anything on this document telling you that it: a) Isn’t official; and b) Is a scam.
Then go try a search on the Internet for American Premier Funding (A subprime mortgage bundler). Here’s a hint as to the misleading-ness of this mailing: Doesn’t the “APV/OV” in the address next to the seal look extremely official and government-y? APV stands for “American Premier Funding”. I have no idea what “OV” stands for. I’m guessing it’s an internal code of some sort.
Oh, and 204(a) of the National Housing Act, as amended in 1989 does not apply to our neighborhood or to us, as I’m sure we would have discovered had we been stupid enough to respond.
A commenter on my previous post suggested that most of the folks going into default on their mortgages were scammers who were looking to get rich quick. I challenge him to view this document and tell me who is the scammer and who is looking to get rich quick.
The sad thing about this is that a lot of people probably saw this as an opportunity to climb out of their credit card debt they’d been able to climb into so easily. I don’t blame this completely on the credit card companies, but it’s a symptom of the wider malaise in our culture and our economy that suggests the companies extending credit are good, buying things you can’t afford is good, and accepting interest rates in excess of three times prime in addition to fees is normal.
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