Condo conversions, straw buyers and mortgage fraud!

What a great mix!  During the peak of the real estate bubble we experienced a trend where real estate investors would buy up multi unit rental buildings or townhouses and then convert them to condominiums which they then resold at huge profits.  Nothing wrong with that.  I personally watched a few friends make hundreds of millions of dollars doing these condo conversions, things were going along swimmingly until the real estate bubble started to deflate, that's when things started to get really interesting.  Investors that purchased these types of properties after the market peaked found themselves with units that they paid way too much for and quickly found that there was no legitimate buyers for their grossly overpriced units.  The saving grace for these property owners?  FRAUD!  

Here's a story from California that sums up one such situation to a t.