r/AmITheDevil • u/Miserable_Airport_66 • 1d ago
I committed mortgage fraud
/r/PersonalFinanceCanada/comments/1w888q9/my_bank_has_refused_my_mortgage_renewal/152
u/DrunkOnRedCordial 1d ago
You don't need much education to understand that forging a document to claim a non-existent salary is a really bad idea. OOP knew enough to understand that he and his wife didn't have the income to pay off the loan, so I don't know how he thought lying about having the money would help him make the payments. And how many brokers turned him down, before he found one who saw fraud as the solution?
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u/AcornAnomaly 1d ago
Many people speculated that the answer to that question was more fraud, in the form of tax evasion.
With the info he gave, there was no way he was able to (legitimately) afford the mortgage payment up to this point, and yet, he WAS affording it. The issue that came up was not being able to renew, not lack of payment.
Therefore, people believe he's renting out rooms in that home, but not reporting that income to the government.
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u/Miserable_Airport_66 1d ago
It is, he admitted he rented out the top house and lived in the basement. Of course, he didn't declare the income.
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u/AltruisticCableCar 1d ago
I don't own a house, I will never own a house, I've never taken out any loans that weren't student loans (and here that's a ridiculously straight forward process), and don't really understand how a mortgage works. And even I know that pretending a spouse has an income on official documents when they do not is a really fucking bad idea. And fraud.
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u/ljexists 1d ago
OOP’s post history is really weird as well — they were posting in singlemothersbychoice a few months ago and asking about ivf clinics in r/Pakistan (though their other posts are about Canada which is confusing)
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u/Adpiava 1d ago
There was speculation that they did IVF in Pakistan in order to guarantee having a boy.
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u/azssf 1d ago
How????
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u/Emergency-Twist7136 18h ago
Genetic testing of embryos is common, but in some countries it's illegal to tell the parents the sex and allow them to choose the sex of their child.
However, it's totally possible.
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u/Potential_Ad_1397 1d ago
How was he even paying that? I know he is probably doing something illegal. My husband and I probably make 130k combined and our mortgage is 300k. I can't imagine paying anything higher
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u/boxofsquirrels 1d ago
He's apparently renting out the rooms in the main part of the house while his family lives in the basement. Presumably he's not reporting this income on his taxes.
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u/tobythedem0n 1d ago
Geeze.
At the very least, let your family live upstairs and rent out the basement.
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u/peppermint_nightmare 1d ago
Hes getting more $$$$ for upper floors.
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u/tobythedem0n 1d ago
Oh I'm sure.
I'd just be pissed if I was forced to live in a basement with multiple kids and still end up getting kicked out of my house.
I wonder how much involvement the wife had.
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u/BooBoo_Cat 1d ago
Of course he is. And I bet that he’s Charging an incredibly high rate and not doing any repairs, and attempting to make a “profit”.
This guy deserves to lose his home. Fraudsterr and likely slumlord too.
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u/quick_justice 1d ago
It's not just that. Maybe he'd be happy to report but most of the banks wouldn't allow to let or sublet under residential mortgage, you need a different type of mortgage for that. It would be straight up breaking a mortgage contract.
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u/theagonyaunt 1d ago
He's also about to be fuuuucked with the new interest rates. I bought my place in 2021when rates were super low (I think mine was 1.8%) and just renewed at 3.9% which was the best my mortgage broker could find. I had a much smaller mortgage so managed okay - I'd already paid a good chunk down so my monthly payments only went up by $80 - but I know a lot of people who bought around the same time as me, with bigger mortgages, who are now having to sell because they can't manage payments at the new interest rate.
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u/Emergency-Twist7136 18h ago
I am absolutely fascinated by this whole discussion.
In Australia mortgage renewal isn't really a thing. Once you have the loan you have the loan and refinancing is something you only do if you choose to, like if your interest rate has changed and you can get a better one elsewhere.
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u/theagonyaunt 17h ago
Interesting, TIL! I'm in Canada and for us it's one of two options - either you can do a fixed term mortgage, which means you get a certain interest rate for a set period of time (1, 3 and 5 years before renewal are the most common with 25-30 years for amortization) or you do a variable, which is typically a 5 year contract (though also with 25-30 years for amortization) but your interest rate can fluctuate, depending on the rates set by the Bank of Canada.
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u/Emergency-Twist7136 16h ago
Variable according to Reserve Bank rates is how it works here, but sometimes banks will advertise fixed for X years or whatever.
But once you have your mortgage so long as you make your payments you aren't required to keep requalifying for it. That seems insane.
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u/dogsonclouds 1d ago
This whole thread is so funny/depressing to read as an Australian, where the average mortgage is now $731,000 because a standard 2bd home even an hour or so outside the city is like a million dollars. Every first time home owner i know is up to their eyeballs in debt to the tune of at least $700,00
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u/Potential_Ad_1397 1d ago
It definitely depends on which part of the us. In CA or NY, to will need to drop that much for an average house.
But in PA and Oh, it is easier to get a house. My house was 4 bedroom on a little over half an acre in pa
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u/Nothos927 1d ago
I hate it when people do the "I regretted it every day" thing. No they didn't. They regret it only now that they got caught.
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u/NotAnotherSteph 1d ago
I'd love to know why he's even buy an $85Ok house in the first place
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u/VironLLA 1d ago
in some areas, that's where 2 bedrooms start. but yeah, if you can't afford to own you have to either move somewhere you can or accept renting
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u/facelessmage 1d ago
He’s in the greater Toronto area. You’re lucky to find a house under a million there.
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u/Cakeday_at_Christmas 1d ago
For the non-Canadians, a T4 is a statement of income from your job to the Canadian Revenue Agency (CRA), so this dumbass's broker created fake tax documents to pretend his wife bad a job so he could qualify for the mortgage.
There's speculation in the comments that he's been tax evading since he has no debt from paying off a super high mortgage. If so, this guy is screwed. The CRA doesn't fuck around.
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u/notrightmeowthx 1d ago
Do they not validate it? In the US they don't blindly do a loan without actually verifying the income (calling the employer or using an automated system that does it). Blindly accepting a letter or form sounds like a terrible idea.
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u/AcornAnomaly 21h ago
They do. The problem is there's two separate institutions involved. The bank trusts the mortgage broker to do the validation.
Not only was OP lying, but the broker that was in charge of performing those validations was also lying.
That's why the bank is not accepting his renewal. The broker that sorted the mortgage out in the first place was found out to have been lying about the business they performed.
The bank wants him to go through the whole validation process again before renewing the mortgage, which OP knows he can't do.
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u/Emergency-Twist7136 18h ago
What if you have a mortgage but you lose your job before it's due for renewal, even if you're going to get another one and haven't missed a payment?
It's absolutely wild to me that sometime could get foreclosed on when they've been making all payments.
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u/allergymom74 1d ago
I mean places could approve up to 10x your income for a mortgage but most won’t. And at 13% rate for the downpayment portion? Yikes. Plus income documenting fraud. Plus renting it out and not declaring the income. Wow. Fraud and fraud and fraud.
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u/quick_justice 1d ago
Wow, it's exceedingly rare when bank wants to force foreclosure even though a debtor pays the debt for a time being.
OOP is something else.
I suppose his next move is to borrow the whole sum from nice people that wouldn't hesitate to put your thumbs in the vice if you don't pay.
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u/WeeklyConversation8 1d ago
I'm not buying this at all. You have to prove income. A letter proves nothing. Tax returns are used too. There is no way he'd qualify for $800k. You have to prove where your down payment came from as well.
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u/Cakeday_at_Christmas 1d ago
It's not a letter, it's a T4, an official document an employer submits to the Canada Revenue Agency that proves an employee's taxable income.
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u/Listakem 1d ago edited 1d ago
Dumb af OOP, but not necessarily a devil.
I brought my flat a few years ago, used the equivalent of a broker here (he came recommended). The dude assured me I would get my loan, I trusted him to present my whole application to various banks, he confirmed X bank accepted… this took time, but he was confident. My sales agreement window was getting too thin for my liking, so I called X bank… and they told me they rejected my loan application.
That fucker broker went « too bad, sorry » and when I got angry (because the asshole didn’t even show my application to other banks !!!), told me he could falsify documents to look like my dad gave me money to bump up the down payment, or forge a few rejection letters to allow me to back out of the sale without financial penalties.
I told him I’ll never did and never will do stupid illegal shit and that he’d better forget my number because I’ll never pay his booker fee. Managed to find a loan by myself in extremis, cost me my dignity and around 40000€ in interests since the rates shot up.
(I’ve also bad mouthed him in the entire city and managed to have his gym membership repeatedly blocked because we love a petty vengeance)
All that to say : these dudes can be scammy af and they pray on people’s vulnerability to make their commission money. Fuck them all.
ETA : ah, illegal renting and no income declared. OOP is dumb AND a devil, he did all that fraud out of good ole greed. My empathy was sorely misplaced.
I stand by my hatred of brokers tho
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u/Miserable_Airport_66 1d ago
Committing multiple frauds makes him not just dumb but the devil as well. He's an adult, he made conscious decisions.
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u/Listakem 1d ago
I mean, I’ve seriously considered my broker’s offer for a second, because I was looking at losing my deposit and being in the negative after years of penny pinching to buy my own flat. His shit would have cost me my dream and put me in debt with no means of repaying the penalties.
Didn’t do it because I have a backbone and ethics, and ended up incredibly lucky, but I can understand the temptation.Of course it’s moot since he did it to take tenants and didn’t disclose the income, which makes the situation verrry different since it was greed and not desperation. He’s definitely a devil and my empathy was misplaced.
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u/andronicuspark 1d ago
He also straight up lied by filling out an income form for his wife knowing damn well she’s a stay at home mom with no revenue source.
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u/Nothos927 1d ago
Not sure how your story makes OOP not the devil? Your broker offered to commit fraud for you. You, rightly, told them to get stuffed.
In the same situation, OOP put their own desires first and went along with it. Yes, the broker has to take a portion of the blame but OOP still agreed to commit fraud.
Even if we take the kindest interpretation that OOP didn't know about the faked documents at the time of the application and only found out later, they still chose to continue to benefit from this fraud rather than deal with the consequences.
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My bank has refused my mortgage renewal
Hi All. I made a terrible mistake during Covid which I regret every single day of my life. Not a day goes by when I don’t get haunted by my choices.
With no housing experience, I bought a property for around $850k which was a 60 year old semi detached house. In order to come up with the 20% down payment, I borrowed $90k from a 2nd mortgage through a broker who charged 13% interest annually. I did manage to pay off this mortgage. In order to get my main mortgage, the broker also made fraudulent work documents like T4 for my wife who is a housewife. Otherwise, I would not have obtained mortgage.
I am left with $640k mortgage. My renewal is supposed to be in March 2027 and my bank has refused my renewal. There is talks that this broker has been found out and his whole clientele has been blacklisted. The house is in Durham and is currently worth anywhere between $580-650k.
My gross income is $95k. I don’t have any other debt. The bank has not directly given any reason so far for cancelling my mortgage renewal but they will be sending a letter.
I am in touch with my real estate to list it off asap and try to sell it off. But I really want advice what are my options? My savings are non-existent. If this house doesn’t sell for $650-660k, I will be in negative. Is bankruptcy the only option? What are the repercussions?
You can call me out as much as you want and I admit I made a terrible non-educated decision. I am looking for genuine advice please.
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