Receiver Put in Charge of Loan Firm : Court: Attorney’s job will be to preserve assets and process claims of investors in Univest. They say they have suffered hundreds of thousands of dollars in losses.
Amid allegations of forgery and theft of investor funds, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge Wednesday appointed a temporary receiver to manage the troubled affairs of Univest Home Loan Inc., a real estate lender that is under siege by regulators and dozens of investors whose losses may reach well into the millions of dollars.
Acting on a request by the state attorney general’s office, Judge Robert H. O’Brien appointed Los Angeles attorney David L. Ray to serve as receiver, and ordered Univest and two of its officials to cease soliciting investors and funding new real estate loans.
Ray’s job will be to locate and preserve Univest’s assets and process claims of investors, some of whom say they have suffered individual losses of hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The attorney general’s office applied for the receivership Friday, when it filed suit against Univest, Univest President Ruth Yonemoto and Joel Burakoff, the firm’s chairman and treasurer.
The lawsuit, filed on behalf of the state Department of Real Estate, alleges violations of state real estate laws and seeks to compel the three defendants to reimburse investors for any losses.
“We got what we wanted,†Deputy Atty. Gen. David S. Chaney said after the order appointing the receiver was issued. “I know investors want a lot more, but we’re not at that stage yet.â€
Attorneys for Univest and Yonemoto also appeared Wednesday. They did not contest the restraining order or the appointment of a receiver.
Separately, the Real Estate Department has filed an administrative complaint seeking to revoke Yonemoto’s real estate broker’s license.
The matter also has been referred to the Los Angeles County district’s attorney office.
Over the years, Gardena-based Univest has done a brisk business recruiting investors to fund high-interest and relatively high-risk second- and third-mortgage loans.
A recent audit by the state Real Estate Department found that Univest was servicing about 600 loans with monthly collections of $900,000.
In recent months, however, investors began complaining that monthly payment checks were bouncing.
Attorneys for some investors said their clients discovered that loans they had funded had long since been paid off or did not exist.
The “phantom†loan allegations are focused on Burakoff--until recently, a Friars Club board member who is said to have used his position in the prominent show business social club to enlist victims, including singer Tony Martin, the spouse of dancer and actress Cyd Charisse, and Friar’s Club President Irwin Schaeffer.
Schaeffer’s attorney, Edward G. Lewis, a Friars vice president, said that only a small fraction of the victims were club members.
Burakoff, who is listed in county voting records as a resident of Woodland Hills, is said to be under a doctor’s care and has been unavailable for comment.
His lawyer, George Buehler, said Wednesday that evidence in the case “will show that everything Joel did was in a view to see that none of the investors lost any money.â€
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