As mortgage delinquencies rise each month, and as the number of foreclosures increase each quarter, the “new mantra” of many pro-se and represented consumers is to demand that the mortgage servicer “prove up the original note.” Is this just some new and creative gimmick that has been sold to the desperate homeowners and to a few lawyers who have attended “progressive” seminars or is there really something to it? I submit that there is really something to it.
In my last Credit Slips post, I wrote about what I call the “Alphabet Problem.” Succinctly stated, this problem arises out of the necessity for a true sale of the mortgage note and mortgage from the originator to the sponsor for the securitized trust; then from the sponsor to the depositor for the securitized trust; and finally from the depositor to the owner Trustee for the trust. These multiple “true sales” are necessary in order to make the original asset (the note and mortgage) bankruptcy-remote and FDIC-remote frin the originator in the event the originator files for bankruptcy or is taken over by the FDIC.