Consumer Alert: Questionable Online Lenders Demanding Upfront Fees

Copycat Web Sites

Searching the Internet for similar businesses yielded two Web sites that appear to be nearly carbon copies of the MortgageTree Lending site. The site for one of the companies is identical to MortgageTree Lending's, except that the contact information says that ConsumerPlus Credit is based in Jacksonville, Florida.

Vander Meeden says that the BBB in Jacksonville has received 11 complaints from ConsumerPlus Credit customers who paid advance fees for loans and never received them. The third company with an identical Web site, also based in Florida, has not been the target of any complaints.

A ConsumerPlus Credit representative says the company has no relation with MortgageTree Lending, but declined to comment further. Telephone messages left for the third firm were not returned.

A Prevalent Crime

"These people will never see their money again," says Robertson of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

Even worse, victims of these scams will likely see their personal information used in identity theft crimes.

Robertson says that advance fee mortgage scams are a lucrative criminal enterprise. Currently Internet-based advance fee loan scams rank number two when it comes to fraud reported to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Call Center's PhoneBusters site.

Here in the U.S., the Federal Trade Commission says advance fee loan scams are consistently in the top ten list for fraud.

"Once people wire the money to a third party it becomes extremely hard to catch the bad guy," says Steve Baker of the FTC.

Law enforcement may have a difficult task catching these con artists, but it's not impossible. New Hampshire's district attorney's office, in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Justice, successfully convicted Michael Wyatt of Plainfield, New Jersey on one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Wyatt was apparently involved in an advance fee loan scheme with Larry and Christopher Stallings of Wautaga, Texas and others. Between 2003 and 2005 the group cheated people out of a total of $2.4 million. They found their victims by advertising on the Internet.

You can file a complaint about a suspected online scam with the Internet Crime Complaint Center, a joint venture of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and the National White Collar Crime Center. In addition, you can register a complaint with the Better Business Bureau, which will also try to resolve the issue.

But the best advice is to avoid doing business with a company without doing your research first.