Fraud Exceeds $4 Billion in 2007

Posted by California RealEstateRama

February 22, 2008

DALLAS — (Feb. 4, 2008) Mortgage fraud activity jumped past $4.0 billion last year — with California and Ohio leading the way, according to the FraudBlogger Index published and maintained by http://www.MortgageDaily.com.

During 2007, an estimated $4.0 billion in mortgage fraud was identified nationwide by FraudBlogger.com. The activity brought the FraudBlogger Index to 6550.

The dollar volume soared from $1.6 billion in 2006, when the index stood at 5020.

“As the real estate market unraveled last year, mortgage fraud could no longer be hidden,” said MortgageDaily.com Publisher Sam Garcia. ”A growing number of cases involving inflated home values and false application information were uncovered.

A minimum of $100,000 was used for all cases tracked, including when no amount was available. The national total index is an aggregate of all state data.

National Fraud Index

2007 Index Level	2007 $ Amount	2006 Index Level	2006 $ Amount
6550	$4,004,127,260	5020	$1,593,572,894

By state, California saw the highest dollar volume, with an estimated $1.6 billion in mortgage fraud during 2007. New York followed with $0.6 billion.

The state with the highest index level last year was Ohio, at 720. Ohio’s higher index reflected a greater number of mortgage fraud cases than any other state.

2007 State Fraud Indices

Rank	State	2007 Index Level
1.	Ohio	720
2.	California	680
3.	New York	610
4.	Florida	550
5.	Missouri	460
6.	Georgia	380
7.	Illinois	320
8. & 9.	Minnesota & North Carolina (each)	250
10.	Texas	240

The complete report, including the fraud index level and dollar volume for each state is available to MortgageDaily.com subscribers at:
http://www.MortgageDaily.com/FraudIndex020408.asp

Complete mortgage fraud activity is comprehensively chronicled at:
http://www.FraudBlogger.com

In depth mortgage industry fraud issues are reported at:
http://www.MortgageDaily.com/MortgageFraud.asp?spcode=pr

About the FraudBlogger Index
The index reflects active criminal and civil mortgage fraud cases tracked by FraudBlogger.com — a comprehensive journal of mortgage fraud reports, crimes and civil litigation. Cases involving larger dollar amounts were given greater weight. No fraud activity tracked during a given month would result in an index of zero.

About MortgageDaily.com
Founded in 1998, MortgageDaily.com is a dominant mortgage industry news source. Around one million mortgage business news pages are viewed monthly at MortgageDaily.com and its affiliate publications.

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