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Repossession of a taxi company completely

While I have thousands of cases that I remember at least hundreds of those really vividly stick clearly in the memory. One thing about doing repossession with Skip Tracing is the fact that you will probably never forget the case in a lifetime. I’m not talking about running an IRB search and getting some possible addresses, I am talking about actually doing an investigation in order to complete the repossession.

The repossession will become forever embedded in your memory soon after you start a deep chase on the debtors trail. You will have learned everything about this person or people. By the time they are found, you feel that you already know them for a long time.

In this work you will have repossession companies that will say they do skip as well for an extra $100 or $200. What they are talking about is a real minor investigation including running a short comp and getting a few other possibles, maybe including a door knock. If its a large bank, believe me they have already done the preliminaries. Banks use the same software investigation companies use plus they call the crap out of the debtor which I explained in a previous article that this will do nothing but advise the debtor people are actively looking for him.
The last thing they want to do is get a bill for an extra thousand on a real car investigation. For us that is what we did so each and every case has already been out for a month or two, has been worked by the bank and a repossession company. Once they have no more luck, the case would come to us and we would effectively clean it up.

I begin the search for this taxi company and start doing all the preliminary things that I would do when first starting a case. This wouldn’t be my first complete taxi company, and they are tougher because usually you need to get every taxi cab at the same time, if you don’t you can kiss the others goodbye for a while as they will become real deeply hidden, most likely with drivers. This was a foreigner that had been in the United States for around 2 two years. As I needed to organize an entire crew to grab all the cabs at once, I decided to make contact with this guy, that it wouldn’t be that big of a deal since the bank was calling him daily anyways. Also it was one of the rare occasions to have a local case so I knew even if I called him and he hid them, I would still find all of the taxis.

I call him and he answers his cell phone. I introduced myself and explained why I was calling. I asked him where he was currently living and he told me F-You and hung up. I thought OK, let me do some further research before getting a local team together. I begin to locate some older associates and find one in particular that I knew was more then just a friend or associate. I called her and she was thrilled to tell me where he lived currently. She further explained what garbage this guy was from North Africa and that he promised her everything but after the second pregnancy in 2 years of knowing her, he walked out, left her with two kids alone.

She continued to tell me stories about this guy and the more I heard the more I couldn’t wait for the evening to come around to grab these taxis. These were not yellow cabs, these were all mini vans and there were 7 of them. I happily write down the good address for this guy. I organize a team and take several of them in my car and the rest in another car. We drive into this apartment complex and way deep in the back were all of these mini vans sitting right there. The light was on in his 3rd floor apartment. Two of the guys get out and check VIN numbers and we are good.

We had keys for all of them in hand. We pull away and park towards the front of the complex, we move and as we get closer some of them had the alarm buttons on the keys which you push and the lights blink. It was obvious which ones were ours, we just wanted to make sure as there may have been more without loans already paid.

As they all left, I was in the last one and I saw him looking out the 3rd floor window with the light brightly on.

Not that intense but always remembered. Lesson learned for this North African to perhaps stop screwing over American women so much.

T Mobile doing cell phone repossessions

By Steve Leave a Comment

An interesting subject came up in a conversation about 2 weeks ago and in my opinion should be illegal and just becomes another big move for cell phone company lobbyists essentially making companies like this above the law.

A guy I know around 2 months ago purchased a used T Mobile Galaxy S2 phone for $250.00. Before buying the phone, he checked it out, it worked great, he checked out everything he could. He even brought the phone to a local T Mobile store to make sure the used phone was legit and not stolen which it was not. The phone was purchased 6 months prior by the guy selling it and it was on a PREPAID plan.

The guy who bought the phone put in his sim card and everything was great, he used the phone daily for the next 3 to 4 weeks. Suddenly one afternoon he is using the phone and it blanks out. He begins to get an error message stating the cannot find sim card. He called Samsung and they assisted with trouble shooting, they checked the IMEI number and everything was good on their end. They did a hard master reset on the phone and still no luck. The Galaxy was useless, so being only 7 months old, the phone was still under full factory warranty. Samsung customer care gave an address and postage email and the guy sent the phone in.

It took about 10 days and he received an email stating that T Mobile effectively rendered the phone useless. What? They killed the IMEI number by way of technology and repossessed the Galaxy S2 without even having a repoman take it. They just ruin the phone from a computer and its done. No you cannot just change the sim card, this is an IMEI change that kills it dead, bricks it. They sent him the phone back.

The guy was pissed, first instinct was to locate the seller for a refund. But he had no memory as to who the seller was and whatnot, plus it just wasn’t worth it to risk a possible fight over a $250 phone.

He told me about it so I went online and researched it. Sure enough T Mobile somehow got a bill passed that they can render useless a mobile phone even though the phone was given as unsecured debt. In other words the phones are not signed as collateral upon purchase according to what I read so far.

Amazingly we have citizens that are actually in agreement with this stating that they should screw over the thief or person who does not want to pay. If this was the case it wouldn’t be as bad. However the problem is the good guy gets robbed. The guy who buys the phone on the used market since the repossession is not the same day or week. it can happen months later.

This action was not to deter criminals or not to hurt thieves. This action is clearly to kill the used phone market and increase new phone sales by way of strong lobbyists and some friendly folks in Washington agreeing to this.

In fact, if you own a Samsung galaxy S2 or S3 and it really does get stolen or lost. You call T Mobile to kill the IMEI they will say sorry, we don’t do that. This action is one of the most aggressive anti consumer actions I have seen get past in the recent years.

T Mobile words it to make it sound like the rule only applies to stolen phones period. If any of you were trying to buy a used phone, forget it as the risks are far to high with companies like these having their way with used consumers. Buyer Beware

What next? You cant pay the credit card bill so the bank has the right to evaluate what was purchased and send out the repoman on unsecured debt? We should all absolutely pay our bills, however we do have laws and clear differences between secure and unsecured debt. Credit card companies make up for by way of fees, late charges and high interest rates. When you go into a phone store, you are essentially getting a credit card to use on a phone. When you buy a car, it is clearly stated that it is a collateral based loan, you don’t pay, you lose the car. Two much different scenarios with similar outcomes. America needs to stop this bullying by above the law companies.

What do repossession companies do if auctions close?

By Steve Leave a Comment

As I recently wrote in the last article about the changes in auto auctions as of late. Thinking further into the issue, imagine the differences if the auto auctions decided to shut the doors. It could happen, I mean just look at Blockbuster video which happens to have been the same founder as Mnahiem auctions. I never thought thought Blockbuster would close just like that, but little did I realize at the time how significant cultural changes are affecting business of today.

It could happen, the auction could realize that even with the massive lay offs they put into effect a few weeks ago, it just isn’t worth it, cashflow has diminished, used car sales have dropped ten fold and the auctions cannot survive just on repossession cars. They need trade ins, they need, banks, bottom line a few years back one auction in Florida was doing thousands of cars each week, now that number has turned to hundreds. As a private company, perhaps you can just layoff as needed, tighten the belt and make adjustments moving forward. Manhiem is a public company that has shareholders and executives, a whole array of additional expenses that private companies do not have and many cannot be cut. Are finance companies and banks ready for this huge change. Will they have to open their own auctions? Its possible, perhaps a large cooperative of auctions between the banks. Of is it just easier, cheaper and less complex to allow the repossession guys to handle the sale as well.

If they close, those of us that liquidate cars will have to get seriously creative. We will of coarse ramp up our online liquidation auctions. Accepting bids on our websites after the waiting period has passed. Sometimes repossession cars sit at auctions for several weeks even months depending on the banks title status and legalities. Imagine if car repossession companies would have to increase storage lots in order to accommodate longer term storage.

Storage fees for finance companies may go up depending on your deal with them. Perhaps you give them a break on storage in order to gain a remarketing contract. A few recent jobs have come up at repossession offices seeking people with remarketing experience so it seems to be a growing trend now.

We will have tent sales more often then not. We will have to set up repossession car lots, if it really ever did get as busy as it once was, which I predict it might with the horrendous impulsive buying at new car dealerships going on. I can see a variety of short term problems and surely some of the smaller auctions will still be around and suddenly get busier.

Thinking back and look forward at all these massive changes occurring we have to look ahead to stay competitive and start calling some future changes. Personally i think the auction disappearance may be one of them, although it may just become a dot com only thing.

Auto Auctions Nationwide

By Steve Leave a Comment

Many people outside of the repossession industry don’t realize what is really going on. They still see cars on the roads and in a big way. Do they notice that most of the cars are new? No, not really. The used car market has dried up for several years now.

People with bad credit are holding on to their cars much longer. These days when you look at auto auction inventory you see cars with much higher miles typically. Not uncommon to see cars with 200k to 300k miles selling for twice as much as it was 5 years ago. Car dealerships are taking in trades that are barely breathing and this is what makes it to the auction. The used car market has dried up, used car dealerships are a dime a dozen and as soon as one opens another closes. However, the buy here pay here lots are doing well also due to major credit disabilities.

Since we do liquidation and remarketing as well, we are always at the auctions and we see first hand what is going on. It’s not pretty. The auctions used to be a great place for work, but the nations largest auto auction Manhiem just a few weeks ago laid off thousands of workers across the board.
Always plenty of repossessions going through, but very light on the car dealer trades. Our new ever changing culture dictates new car sales will prevail. For this reason, I say repossession will be much better and growing in the near future.

We walked into one of the busiest Manheim auctions last week and asked the front desk where is everyone and she let us know. Very sad to see all those people go after building careers for so long.

What we once had in the United States is surely gone and never coming back. But we have to continue to move forward and work hard, be creative and whatever it takes.

What will we do without the auctions? If Manheim was to close we would have to start getting real creative.

Repossession in the Florida Canal

By Steve Leave a Comment

After in the business for a while you will start to build these vivid memories of repossessions that you have completed or were involved in. I have so many vivid memories which many I will try to share with you in this repossession blog.

We had been performing skip trace on this medium sized yacht. We finally located the yacht however when we sent the spotter over, he told us the only way to get to it was through the canal actually swimming across from one side to the other. Luckily there was access on the opposite side.

Personally I am a good swimmer and really don’t mind too much swimming in a canal once in a while. This job for strange reasons had to be done after midnight, the yacht had a form of security on it that had to be bypassed. We decided to do the repossession at around 2am.

Pitch Black Water in the Middle of the Night

While it was a few years back, I remember specifically the chill in the water that night. It was two of us and we had some back sacks on and began the swim across. The water was pitch black and the sky wasn’t that clear either. There was a strong silence around us and you could feel the adrenaline pumping. At around the halfway mark, I hear a slight noise in the water. I had no idea what it was. Some quick thoughts came to mind first being a Manatee.

Is it a Shark?

I asked my partner if he heard it also and he said no. We continued swimming without making noise. Suddenly I feel this rather strong nudge on my right side and I panic a little, thinking holy shit, it’s a shark. I felt the skin and as I panic more my partner says he saw it and it appears to be a dolphin. At this point I have a slight pain in right ribs but it didn’t matter, when the adrenaline pumps, nothing can stop you. We continue on, well we really never stopped. We see next to us is actually not one but two dolphins swimming close by.

Kind of freaky swimming with dolphins at 2am in a pitch black canal. we finally get to the yacht and we both board. We verify the hull number, we disable the security, find the keys, untie it and we are gone. It was one of those experiences that lingers in your mind for years to come. No real danger, just a surprising thing that turned out to be dolphins.

Who needs Discovery Cove when we have canals everywhere in Florida..

My Thoughts on Future Repossessions

By Steve Leave a Comment

People think naturally that when an economy is bad the repoman makes the cash. This can be true but in some cases it is not. A good example of this was shortly after the heavy mortgage crisis which still plagues us in most areas. While people were hurting and losing their homes, the banks stopped lending at all and used car sales plummeted. I remember speaking with some repomen that I knew in the area and they said they were hurting badly, some even had 5 or 6 trucks just sitting around collecting dust. There were still many repossessions going on, but if you were working for major banks, chances are you were dead.

Despite the mortgage crisis continuing, in the past 4 years a tremendous amount of immigrants(Florida especially)have come to many states buying new cars as soon as credit allows, explaining the tremendous growth in new car sales.

In fact in my years doing repossession, I have never seen so many new cars on the roads. It could be good for some repomen and it could be bad for others. Reasons being is most of these purchases is being done at the dealerships directly.

Brands and Finance Companies

Dealerships such as Ford, Toyota, Hyundai, Kia, Honda and I almost forgot the new crop of BMW that is almost as common as Toyota Corolla at this point. Unless all these cars are being paid for with cash, there are an abundance of people buying these cars on impulsive decisions, without a second thought of where the income may be four years down the road on a 72 month loan.

These particular finance companies are working with their regular agents, so a good job would be with a company that has an account with one of the above finance companies. I think personally although I could be wrong that regular major banks are still not lending as they did several years back. I highly doubt this will ever happen again. Finance companies is where it will be at big time.

There will always be in house financing that is open game for those looking to break into the repossession business on their own.

Violence Increasing

As things will certainly get worse down the road, and it also seems that people are more on a short fuse these days. Along with the major cultural change here and continually coming, having lived several years in third world countries, violence was not an occasional argument leading to a fight, in fact in most countries I lived, life was cheap. Violence is abundant, compulsive violent tendencies, and in my opinion it will increase significantly over the next several years right here at home so we as repomen must figure out better routines and ways to protect ourselves, the scheduled influx of 60k drones will not protect in the least.

In some cases banks will pay much more then the value of the car

By Steve Leave a Comment

One time while I was not doing car repossessions any more. One of the banks gave me a call and asked me to do them a favor. I asked what is it? They said it was a car, I asked why? They said this guy cursed them out every time they called about the car. They couldn’t find the car and the guy was hiding it. They said they wanted the car no matter what the condition or value. I saw at this point, he pissed off the wrong person at the bank. In fact I am willing to go out on a limb and say, had he been decent with them on the phone, perhaps said he was struggling they probably would have gave up the car and just put him in collections for the balance.

They told me don’t worry we will make it worth you’r while. They said it is an 95 BMW M3. They said we will give you title plus a grand for your expenses. I quickly agreed, they faxed the particulars and I bought a one way ticket to New York. It was fine since I am from NY originally and I have family there to stay with. As soon as I got the order, I ran a comp and did some preliminary investigation work, I printed everything out and planned on staying in NY for around 4 or 5 days.
>I arrived in NY, it was late afternoon, I rented a car and went to the 3 immediate locations that I had for him with no car showing.

I drove to his work and waited near his second car that he owned. As soon as he showed up, I told him. Listen, I just flew in for the BMW and I am not leaving without it so do me a favor and let me know where it is. He was nervous and believe it or not said OK as long as he could take his stereo out that he recently put in. I agree’d. I followed him to the car and the repossession was under way. It was that easy, I couldn’t believe it.

The car had big chrome wheels, not fat but tall. The paint was scratched up, especially on the hood. Everything worked well and it started right up. I was driving this car back to Florida so aside from the big chrome wheels it drove well, but surely the handling was bad due to the rims. I drove over to my families house to stay for the weekend and drive home on Monday. I parked my new ride in front and the first thing they asked was about the chrome rims. At first they nice choice on rims trying to be nice. I then told them the story and they laughed.

I had already contacted the police department in NY, you have to call it in prior to or go to the nearest precinct in some parts of Long Island as well.

I called the bank and asked them to send me the title as soon as they could. Upon arriving in Florida, first thing I did was find some real M3 wheels and changed out those chrome wheels.

Skip Tracing is like a drug for some people

By Steve Leave a Comment

Skip tracing for many of us is a rush. Skip tracing is like solving a big puzzle. It doesn’t matter where in the world, for us the world is small and countries are just little pieces to the puzzle. Sometimes they were obstacles in the way depending on the local laws, like Mexico. Speaking of Mexico, not to get off subject, but it is just so wacky to me how some of these countries we help so much get away with the abuse for us as they do. Pakistan is another, I could go on all day long but I ‘ll get back on subject.

I could go into almost any country with prior notice of what the reason was and most countries are more then willing to assist in anyway they can. Of coarse on occasion you run into the (above) typical corruption and USA hating deals but whatever. You learn or figure out how to work around these obstacles because really that’s all they are and we cannot let them get into our way. We have a manhunt that must get solved and we will pursue this manhunt with complete and relentless passion to stay the very best at what we do.

We have a reputation to maintain, we have to build our recommendation letter pile. We have money to be made and there is no way a case as small as the world will stop us in our manhunt.

This skip tracing becomes our drug, it flows through our veins and each case is like it’s the last case we will ever do. We are not doing ordinary skip tracing we are the clean up crew and get it done. We put ourselves in his shoes, we look back to the day of signing and move forward from there, all previous mediocre investigation work is non existent. We start fresh from A and put each piece together as it falls. We have a certain level of confidence that sets us apart. Does it matter to me that 3 other skip tracers have previously worked this case? Hell no, not even for a minute.

Our wives wonder why we wake up sporadically in the middle of the night during a case that sits in our mind. They don’t understand the power of a manhunt. We chase him down from state to state or from one country to another. We learn his habits, we learn those who are close to him. We gain traction and get closer to solving our manhunt.

Skip tracing is not for everyone, especially a really good skip tracer. It may be able to be learned, but personally I think allot of it is natural. As you embark on your first skip trace or manhunt, you will see how it sits with you. Skip trace takes allot of patience and intelligence, typically more intelligence then who you are seeking.

Finance Company Desperation and the Repoman

By Steve Leave a Comment

During my career as a repoman, I have worked with Credit Unions, Banks, Finance companies, Car lots, Attorneys and even private citizens that hold a note on a unit. In all that time being a repoman doing car repo work I was able to measure if you will the level of aggression from each.

I have to say by a long shot large well known finance companies will be the most aggressive. They start out normal but once the case on a 10 thousand plus asset becomes closer to charge off, the aggressive tactics begin. I have seen finance companies use police where it is illegal to use police to talk to people as the repoman stands by on the phone or around the corner. I have never been involved or seen any bank do this, but I see the large scale finance companies pull this crap and end up getting away with it while it is a clear case of wrongful repossession. In fact if a repoman want’s to use a police tactic the bank does not want anything to do with it as they know, they can easily be sued or lose the entire collateral with someone that has a slight inkling of the law.
I believe large finance companies use tactics such as extreme aggression or even repo companies utilize tactics like these in hopes that the debtor will never come fourth with a case against them, or in hopes the debtor will be too scared to come forward knowing that hiding the car was wrong or having a repoman involved was wrong in the first place.

I have heard of a large finance company send a cop to a residence making contact with the debtor and telling him he was going to go to jail if he didn’t tell him where the collateral was by a certain date. I have seen a cop leave a note on a door on an actual police business card, advising the debtor it would be grand theft against him for not producing the car. In this particular state both of these actions are completely illegal but due to the aggressive nature of the big finance company with deep pockets, they bet on the fact that they would get the car and never get sued.

At that time there were less attorneys doing cases like that on a contingent basis or at least not advertising so. Now, many more law firms are becoming hip to the fact that these law suits are very real and usually work in the debtors favor. If a repoman is involved which usually he is, he better have wrongful repossession insurance as these ruthless finance companies will allow the repoman to take the fall.

It’s kind of like how large banks are now with the citizens. They play the grey lines, they count on the fact that few if any will sue them for wrongful fee’s. Large banks, finance companies and credit cards will continue charging wrongful, grey area clearly illegal fees until someone comes along and gets awarded a few million. The banks do not care, they will make much more then the few million loss the lawsuit produces. In essence, the finance company will lose a car and legal fees here and there on a wrongful repossession case as it is a drop in the bucket compared to the many they get away with.

A Criminals Downfall

By Steve Leave a Comment

While most people that get involved in repossession are simply law abiding people that bought over their heads. People that lost their jobs or had to make a decision of either paying the mortgage or rent as opposed to paying that brand new car.

Throughout my years in the industry a growing number of cases are with criminals which will get found. You have to remember for many of us, we love the puzzle, we are well paid and our fee is probably contingent. There is no question that we will focus on the repossession more then any other agency might. Not that they are bad in locating, it’s just that they have allot of cases and this simply may not be as important to them to put all of their focus on. They have the red tape of jurisdiction so on and so fourth. While we only need the collateral, it is usually with the criminal and it gets documented in our investigation report.

While many of the criminal cases are directly related to the collateral such as identity theft, or buying millions of dollars in collateral with 4 banks at the same time, or bringing 20 new Mercedes cars to a chop shop changing the VIN numbers. More likely then not, the cases will be non collateral related but the skip on that particular car is what causes the criminals downfall.

A small example would be the VooDoo trail article I wrote when it was only a few cars that were not generating even a tenth of what this criminal was generating with the mortgage fraud, but yet it was the car guy that ended up finding him and documenting his location.

You ask yourself why would this criminal use those same names he was making hundreds of thousands of dollars on with mortgage fraud on some crappy cars that he would make no money on?

Was it that he needed a car? He clearly could have paid cash on his first mortgage criminal activity.

Was it that before his first mortgage criminal activity he didn’t have enough to pay cash for a car?

Maybe he started this criminal scheme with thoughts of doing this with cars only and later ran into a guy that would partner with him mortgage wise.

There are lots of scenarios and later I will be making rather interesting articles on some other example cases we did where the car took down the criminal for something unrelated. It has always baffled me how the little things bring them down by the guys investigating the smaller stuff.

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Is it a Shark?

Brands and Finance Companies

Violence Increasing

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