Wikipedia defines predatory lending as "the industry professional practice of using a borrower’s ignorance against them for profit. It is often referred to as an affliction that only strikes racial minorities, women, and the elderly. While these focus groups are certainly prone for victimization, for which the ramifications cut far deeper & are usually life-altering, predatory lending runs silently unregulated amongst all demographics. Predatory lending can be identified by deceptive marketing and sales practices, non-disclosure of all terms that relate to the qualification and payback of the loan, and falsifying documentation to gain otherwise unattainable loan approvals, although the actual term is an umbrella to numerous specific scenarios." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predatory_lending) 

        Mobile home dealers and lenders are notorious for predatory lending -- and that is a major reason that repossession rates are at record levels. Predatory lending takes many forms: high interest rates, exorbitant fees, financing for insurance products, misleading advertising, failure to disclose pertinent loan information, and simply lending money without regard to a customer's ability to pay. Don't be a statistic -- learn how to identify and defeat attempts to force you into a bad loan that can ruin your life! In a recent survey conducted by the mortgage insurance company Radian Guaranty, over half of homeowners (site-built included) said they didn't know much about the mortgage options that were available when they bought their homes. Read The Manufactured Home Buyer's Handbook before you sign anything! Don't be one of the victims paying $300,000 for a manufactured home, or worse . . .

        Some dealerships now seem to be taking predatory lending to an extreme even for this industry. In 2004, there were 25 lawsuits in Texas alone alleging that Clayton Homes*, Vanderbilt Mortgage and several Clayton associates forged customer signatures on loan documents to fraudulently procure their land! The basic modus operandi seemed to be that Clayton dealerships would forge signatures to claim customers’ land (which was used as loan collateral in land-in-lieu-of transactions) when they couldn’t make their payments. The customers which are involved were not in a position to finance a home; that is, a reputable lender would not have made the loan. President and CEO Kevin Clayton seemed to admit the wrong-doing, but claimed, “This is isolated to one location in one market and we see nothing in this case that suggests otherwise.” David Rumley, an attorney involved in the case, strongly disagrees, “Our investigation has shown the forgeries of deeds and trust and documents related to land has occurred in almost every state where Clayton Homes sells trailers.” (Clayton Homes operates in 33 states.) In one instance, the customer lived in a nursing home, and previously had both her arms amputated. In another, the consumer was hospitalized and was having surgery on the day she allegedly signed the documents. (Bill Brewer, August 4th, 2004, Knoxville News-Sentinel)

* Clayton Homes is featured on Tennessee's "Caveat Emptor" (Let the Buyer Beware) List of Businesses as of December 7th, 2005. (Source: http://www.state.tn.us/consumer/documents/pdf2005/BuyerBewareList.pdf. Clayton Homes is based in Maryville, TN.) This list is comprised of companies who have complaints on file with the Tennessee Division of Consumer Affairs. Any response from the company in question is sufficient to have their name removed from this list, whether it remedies the complaint or not. That alone seems to speak volumes about Clayton's actual concern for their customers.
 

 

 Piggy Bank  

Mobile Home