Miller Starr Regalia

The recent foreclosure crisis has brought into focus an area of real property law that until now was rarely controversial-the right and power of an assignee of mortgage indebtedness, acting for itself or through an agent, to foreclose and collect on real property secured debt.  Due to the proliferation of secondary market transactions, including sales of whole loan portfolios and securitization transactions, the high volume of mortgage transactions in the early 2000's produced an unprecedented number of sales and transfers of the debt interests and the mortgages and deeds of trust to which they relate.  Records of such transactions-and files of the original loan documents themselves-were sometimes not created or maintained, and often can be difficult if not impossible to locate.  As the loans went into default in equally large numbers, the existence, sufficiency and authenticity of paperwork in the mortgage transfer process has become a focus of conflict and dispute.

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