I was watching the Oscars the other night with my wife and couldn’t help but feel a sense of surprise and sadness when the director for Inside Job commented during his acceptance speech that it has been 3 years since the financial crisis and not a single one of the big players at the financial institutions who likely caused the financial crisis has been held accountable.   Let that sink in for a minute.

They were nice enough to take our tax dollars offered up so quickly by “American Hero” Paulson and company, and then they quickly stopped lending money to small businesses and homeowners alike.  Any rookie Realtor could have negotiated a better deal with the Big Banks than these mutts did.  They basically gave away our money with no strings attached.  Nice job, guys.

And last year we come to find out that the Big Banks may have committed Mortgage Fraud and have generously given us yet another iconic phrase to add to our collective vocabulary to go along with derivative, mortgage-backed security,  and Madoff: enter Robo Signing.

Since all real estate is local I’ll get tot he point: I’m still seeing some fallout in the Denver and Boulder real estate markets from the latest rotten gift from our banking buddies.  Where I was previously seeing some first-timers jump into the market and gobble up a foreclosure or two, I’m now seeing that trend grind to a halt.  Experienced investors are tentative as well.  There are so many unknowns when you buy a foreclosure property that when we now add chain of title to the mix it’s just too much for some to handle.

So, thanks Big Banks.  We’re basking in your generous dividends.  Part of me really hopes that The  Aussie has something up his sleeve for you.