Woman Recovers Title To Home As Judge Invalidates Deed In Lieu Unwittingly Signed When Obtaining Loan

In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, The Philadelphia Inquirer reports:

• When federal securities officials closed Robert Stinson Jr.'s real estate investment firm - Life's Good Inc. - for alleged investment fraud in June, they said it had no "significant" property holdings. There was no way they could have known how much the house at 1200 S. Ruby St. in Southwest Philadelphia meant to Joan Porterfield. She had inherited the house from her mother, but lost it to Life's Good after mortgaging it in September 2007 for $25,000.

• "On the papers they filed at City Hall, it shows like I gave them my property," even though she had no intention of doing so, Porterfield said. Porterfield, 47, has since won a judge's order to have the Ruby Street house put back in her name. But she remains shaken by the ordeal, choking back tears as she talks about the small rowhouse as the only thing she has left from her mother.

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• In the packet of loan documents Porterfield signed for the mortgage on 1200 S. Ruby St. was a deed in lieu of foreclosure, which allowed Life's Good to take the house without going through foreclosure. Life's Good did so in November 2008. [...] Fortunately for Porterfield, her attorney argued successfully in court that the deed in lieu of foreclosure for 1200 S. Ruby St. should be invalidated because Life's Good did not register it within 90 days of its signing, as required by Pennsylvania law, according to court documents. Porterfield said she still owed her attorney $3,618. "That's why I don't have the deed right now. He needs his money," she said.

For the story, see Despite mortgage fraud, woman gets her house back.