Just to give you an update on the situation, as you all know the last few years have been really rough identity theft…divorce, a short sale and an attempted loan modification on my primary mortgage. I am not giving up on the loan mod and I have an amazing bankruptcy attorney in San Diego who is helping me through the process.  Thank you Julian.

Since the very beginning I’ve had an Equifax account and I’ve used it to keep track of my credit score. I used to have a 720 and at the low point of my credit score I had a 542. Last night I ran my “score power” from Equifax I pre-purchased 10 of these in the results were actually pretty cool, my credit score is now 589 and my Aurora loan services account and my Bank of America second loan shows as paid with a zero balance. While the Aurora shows 120 days late Bank of America shows a zero balance with pays as agreed!

I checked all of my other line items including open credit cards credit limits revolving lines of credit and the Equifax report was actually fairly accurate. One of the huge hits that I took was in my consumer credit basically my credit cards. I used to have over $80,000 in available credit, now I have from the major American Express Bank of America and Citibank a combined total of 1500. The interesting thing is I have a credit card attached to my credit union account that gets used as an overdraft protection, that has $22,000 in credit. This is because every month depending on the time of the month I hit for over $1000 and then I have it set up to automatically sweep money into and pay off the account or as close as I can get from monies that I deposit into my checking account.

Obviously this type of activity is “good” and the bank seems like it, and they are rewarding me appropriately.

I’ll keep updating as I get more information, I hope somebody out there is finding this useful.

This is my quick summary of what happens when you short sell, I did try a loan modification but they were not interested in taking it to a level that I could afford.

• I made a conscious choice to stop paying the bill.
• I use bill pay, so I notified the bank to stop any withdrawals from the lender.  I heard that you have to stop any and all debit attempts, some people just stop it for the exact amount of the payment and find out that the next month the bank withdrew a few cents less and the charge went through.  So make sure you stop all debt requests.
• Keep paying you HOA if you have one, they can be vicious and interfere with a short sale.
• Take the money that you should have been paying on your mortgage and transfer it to credit card debt, because at the 60 day late point your credit card companies will get updated and make significant changes to your account.   (Not quite sure how the new December laws will impact this but, pay off those revolving debts fast)
• I had three cards with almost $40,000 in availible credit and about $10,000 in outstanding payments due.  As soon as they found out about the mortgage late they cut the availible credit down to the amount of the balance and upped the interest rate.
• Also as soon as I make a payment especially on American Express they adjust the availible credit down to match the total I have on the card – basically making the card unusable because as soon as I pay they reduce the credit by that amount.
• The Bank of America card is down to $1000 and the Citibank card was closed.
• Get used to the phone calls, I used to get a call a day asking if I could make a payment.  Most people are really polite and want to help, they know that you are not the only person going through this.  Its just the phone used to ring all the time.
• I got the phone to stop ringing by having an attorney send them a letter disputing the debt and requested that I be placed on a do not call list.  This lasted about 2 months.
• During that time, I got a real estate agent who found a buyer and we started the short sale process.  He is on the phone with them ever other week.  We have an offer and most of the phone calls have stopped.
• It can take 6 months for the short sale to get approved, I have received the Notice of Default and Notice of Foreclosure.  The foreclosure is scheduled for February, the same month that I am supposed to hear if the short sale got approved.
• CREDIT SCORE is shot, last time I looked it was about 420, and I tried calling a credit repair place but then were unable to help.

So right now I am living without paying my mortgage payment and I have basically paid off the credit card expenses.   Let me tell you just how badly it sucks, especially because I have a business and I used my personal credit all the time….

This is “as mentioned in the message ” to expedite the transfer of the said money.  Who even looks at these emails any more?  But I admit that it’s so tempting – what would I do with a million bucks?

One of the most common methods identity thieves and cybercriminals use to steal personal information is the use of”phishing”. Phishing is a form of social engineering that uses email or instant messages that appear to be from a fmancial institution, government agency, internet based company such as Ebay, or any business that you trust and/or do business with. The intent of the phishing communication is to deceive you into divulging personal informations.

My advice – unless you request the information don’t fill in any form sent to you by “your” bank, your credit union or other financial institution. Also don’t call the 800 number listed on the email – its routed to them and they pretend to be from the bank!  The safest thing to do is to go to the actual website of your bank by typing the address in yourself into the address bar and checking to see if its a real email.

Love it.. Be safe out there.

It’s crazy to think that even you friends can steal from you.

http://www.wboc.com/Global/story.asp?S=9968213&nav=MXEF

http://www.9news.com/news/article.aspx?storyid=111279&catid=188

I use a cross cut shredder – just search Google for it and you can find one for about $100 bucks. Get a shredder that can handle 10-15 pieces at a time, it will save you a ton of effort and it will mulch trough used credit cards and those huge stacks of credit card statements that you have laying around.

There were 48 files that were breached from a server containing information on over 45,000 FAA employees and retirees.

You can read more about it on the FAA website at – http://www.faa.gov/news/press_releases/news_story.cfm?newsId=10394

So now I was getting a little worried, what exactly had I done – I thought that this was a Phishing attempt,, perhaps a way for me to give up some personal information over the phone.

She said that I could just login to my account online, assured me that it was accurate and they would be reducing my credit limit.   They (AMEX) had revieved my credit balance, my OTHER credit card balances and determined that eventhough I have not been late – I am a CREDIT RISK.

So I am now about about $8,400 in credit card limit and my current balance is about a quarter of that.  If anyone knows what can be done please let me know.  This is shit.

It is not as bad as these other people that I found on Google -

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20081112180702AAaWR7G – Hers was lowered to below her current balance!

http://www.thenewstribune.com/business/story/541160.html

The story is that a group of five people in Chicago went on a three day spending extravaganza using fake credit, and store cards. The Attorney General says that there were almost 400 transactions in which the suspects used a cloned or altered card to purchase products and gift cards.

These guys then used E-Bay to sell items and to make bank transfers to cash in on their sales. While I am sure that the thrill of making these purchases it pales in comparison to the joy that we all should get from their arrest and hopeful conviction.

http://www.mlive.com/news/grand-rapids/index.ssf/2009/01/chicagoarea_residents_face_fra.html

All forms of identity theft can be devastating, from a simple lost drivers license that is used as a fake ID all the way to a complete loss of your credit worthiness, money and having a criminal record because of the stolen ID.  The article continues by stating that as part of the abuse, the abusers may use private information, credit info, mother maiden names and other information who in addition to other forms of abuse use their personal information as a means of control.

New York State has a system in place to prevent and mitigate identity theft. Their tips and consumer assistance resources can be found at www.nysconsumer.gov. Consumers may also find this and additional domestic violence information on the OPDV website at www.opdv.state.ny.us.

Their tips are basically the same as with any other identity or fraud protection information.
• Check your credit and account information. Close compromised accounts.
• File police and/or Federal Trade Commission affidavits with credit bureaus. This can be found at http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2002/02/idtheft.shtm
• Place a security freeze on your credit reports.
• Check your free credit report regularly for errors.

You can read the full article about identity theft proection at http://www.romesentinel.com/news?newsid=20081231-141453