Reuters goes to ground to find homes resold at 13 times foreclosure price

Reuters correspondent Nick Carey reports from Chicago on a mortgage-fraud hot spot he found by talking to a nonprofit lender.

Nick Carey of Reuters heard from an editor about a mortgage-fraud hot spot in Chicago. When he went to check it out, he found a trend happening in poorer communities. He writes of one house:

“Public records show it sold in foreclosure for $25,500 in January 2009, then resold for $355,000 in October. In between, a $110,000 mortgage was taken out on the home, supposedly for renovations. This June, the property went back into foreclosure.”

Today’s Tip: Find people who are monitoring real estate from the ground level, Nick says.

In Nick’s story, that person is Emilio Carrasquillo, head of the local office of nonprofit lender, Neighborhood Housing Services of Chicago. Nick says he found Carrasquillo by asking nonprofit sources if they knew of anyone working to help lower-income people. Nick visited the area four times with Carrasquillo, noting in his story the lack of police presence, gang graffiti and boarded-up homes.

Another tip Nicks offers it to ask as many questions as you can – even stupid ones. He says when you’re working on investigative pieces, those questions can generate leads.

To hear more from Nick about the story, check out this interview and video on Reuters.

And for more ideas on tracking victims of mortgage fraud, see this post about reporter David Heath’s experience when he was at The Seattle Times.