Opinion ID: 169778
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Cartel Asset M anagement

Text: Cartel specializes in providing “broker price opinions” (BPO ) 2 and appraisal valuations of real property, primarily residential, for lenders throughout the country. A BPO is a property valuation performed by a real estate professional, either a broker or an agent. The agent drives by the property, photographs it, examines public record data, identifies values of comparable residential property, and provides a written estimate of value for the subject property. Cartel was formed in 1993 in response to the sale of large “pools” or portfolios of nonperforming 3 and foreclosed loans at auction, ranging from 6 2 A BPO is also known as a “comparative market analysis” (CM A). (R. Vol. 8 at 2873.) 3 A nonperforming loan is a loan that is delinquent in payment for ninety days or more. The goal is to turn the loan into a performing loan. However, if this effort is unsuccessful, the loan goes into foreclosure and becomes a “real estate owned” (REO) loan. (R. Vol. 8 at 2872.) At that time, another BPO is -4- loans to 700 loans in a pool. (R. Vol. 8 at 2620-21.) Because of the age of the loans and changing local economic environments, the original loan values were not necessarily related to the present value of the pool property. Potential bidders required current property valuations to determine an appropriate cost for the loans in the pool. Due to the short time period between the announcement of the sale and the date of the loan pool auctions, potential bidders needed these current valuations quickly. To meet this need, over the period of five or six years, Cartel developed a national list of real estate agents and brokers willing to perform a BPO within a stated amount of time for a certain fee. Potential bidders, such as banks, would send Cartel the identities of the properties to be valuated. Cartel would then contact a local broker in the area of each property to perform the BPO. The realtor would return the BPO to Cartel, and after a review for quality, Cartel would send the completed BPO to the potential bidder. According to W alter Coats, the CEO and President of Cartel, Cartel paid the local agents approximately $50 to provide the BPO and charged most of its clients $95 to $105 per B PO .