Mystery company buys tax liens ‘like a machine’ [View all]

[mahatmakanejeeves]

HOMES FOR THE TAKING: LIENS, LOSS AND PROFITEERS — Part 4

Mystery company buys tax liens ‘like a machine’
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2013/12/08/debt-collecting-machine/

Homes for the taking
Michael Sallah and Debbie Cenziper

The firm that threatened to foreclose on hundreds of struggling D.C. homeowners is a mystery: It lists no owners, no local office, no Web site. ... Aeon Financial is incorporated in Delaware, operates from mail-drop boxes in Chicago and is represented by a law firm with an address at a 7,200-square-foot estate on a mountainside near Vail, Colo.

Yet no other tax lien purchaser in the District has been more aggressive in recent years, buying the liens placed on properties when owners fell behind on their taxes, then charging families thousands in fees to save their homes from foreclosure.

Aeon has been accused by the city’s attorney general of predatory and unlawful practices and has been harshly criticized by local judges for overbilling. All along, the firm has remained shrouded in corporate secrecy as it pushed to foreclose on more than 700 houses in every ward of the District.

“Who the heck is Aeon?” said David Chung, a local lawyer who said he wasn’t notified that he owed $575 in back taxes on his Northwest Washington condominium until he received a notice from Aeon. “They said, ‘We bought the right to take over your property. If you want it back — pay us.’ ”
....

Steven Rich, Jennifer Jenkins and Alexia Campbell contributed to this report.

I own mutual funds, bonds, and stocks, including stock in a company that will benefit should the EPA regulations (proposed or actual, I'm not sure which) regarding emissions from coal plants get knocked down. I've worked for an aerospace and defense contractor, and I have money in their retirement fund. I don't join picket lines or protests. I'm about as far from a Marxist as anyone can get.

But this, being threatened by anonymous strangers with extortion or else the loss of your home, really gets to me. It's like primetime television. You think, "they can't get any worse than this," and then they go right ahead and prove you wrong.

Can't anyone stop this?

Part 1: How a small debt becomes a big problem
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2013/09/08/left-with-nothing/

Part 2: Suspicious bids go unnoticed in D.C.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2013/09/09/suspicious-bidding/

Part 3: D.C. tax office mix-ups put homes in peril
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2013/09/10/mistakes-put-homes-in-peril/

Mark Schwartz, an attorney who owns this $1.7 million estate on a mountainside outside Vail, Colo., has been a constant force behind Aeon Financial. His law firm lists its address at the property. (Marc Piscotty for The Washington Post)

Schwartz has a medical degree from the University of Illinois and a law degree from John Marshall Law School in Chicago.