BORROWERS BETRAYED PART 1

Ex-convicts active in mortgage fraud

During Florida's housing boom, state regulators allowed thousands of mortgage professionals with criminal r...

BORROWERS BETRAYED PART 2

Thousands with criminal records work unlicensed as loan originators

Gary Kafka, former body builder with a long rap sheet and violent past, wrote millions of dollars in mortga...

BORROWERS BETRAYED PART 3

State let crooked brokers keep working

State regulators caught mortgage professionals breaking the law but allowed them to stay in the business wi...

BORROWERS BETRAYED PART 4

Home loan racket flourished in Florida

A mortgage executive has gone to prison for racketeering, but a former associate in Homestead still sells m...

Case files of brokers

Scott Almeida Application for mortgage broker license Criminal report affidavit ...

BORROWERS BETRAYED PART 1

About the Herald investigation

The Miami Herald spent eight months examining the Office of Financial Regulation, the state agency responsi...

BORROWERS BETRAYED PART 1

Identity theft is no bar to keeping a broker license

BORROWERS BETRAYED PART 1

For license renewals in Florida, no criminal background checks

BORROWERS BETRAYED PART 1

A criminal past, a trail of new victims

A convicted cocaine trafficker with a mortgage broker license ultimately admitted that he fleeced 30 custom...

BORROWERS BETRAYED PART 1

Who's watching the brokers

The Office of Financial Regulation was created by the Florida Legislature to oversee the state's banks and ...

BORROWERS BETRAYED PART 2

States act to license loan originators

Thousands of people with criminal records work as loan originators in Florida. No license needed.

Fallen figures go to reality TV for redemption

LOS ANGELES - At 52, Ross Mandell is built like an aging wrestler, with veins the size of phone cords webbe...

Commercial real estate is about to turn the corner, experts predict

The CEO of one of the country's top commercial property firms says the industry is turning the corner.

Octogenarians get share of the American Dream

Hank Schmiess waited nearly nine decades for his piece of the American Dream. Schmiess was 89 when he and h...

Real estate Q&A

Question: I've heard that inflation is something we need to worry about. With all this money going to the f...

Rules hinder low-income buyers' loans

Lucas Harrison-Zdenek has tried twice since last summer to get a federal loan to buy a foreclosed home.

Now may be the time to buy a house

If you have a good job and good credit, the next few months might be a sweet time to go house hunting. Then...

Homebuilders hope boomers beat path to their door again

Baby boomer buyers fueled a big run-up in U.S. home construction and sales in the 1970s and 1980s.

From courthouse steps, woman sees dream dissolve

Ethelda Lopez, her husband, teenage daughter and two dogs still live in their four-bedroom, three-bath brow...

Foreclosures take heavy toll on hearts and minds

Just over two weeks ago, a retired telephone company worker named Ethelda Lopez watched as her dream retire...

Woman faces fears day and night as foreclosure looms

It became clear when the fall from her bed left a gaping hole in her mouth: the stress from imminent forecl...

Clinging to hope and home

Elected and appointed officials said the psychological trauma spawned by home foreclosures in Merced County...