Lavish Living Catches Up to Mortgage Fraudster

Last fall David Findel of Colt’s Neck, New Jersey made headlines when he spent $400,000 for two season tickets on the 50 yard line in the new Meadowlands home of the New York Jets, scheduled to open next season year.

Last week he made headlines again when he turned himself into the FBI, charged with a single count of wire fraud related to his mortgage lending company, Worldwide Financial Resources, and posted a $1 million secured bond.

Because of the housing crisis, Findel’s company experienced a liquidity crisis in January 2008. That is when he perpetrated a scheme to defraud mortgage banks by reselling the same mortgages to multiple financial institutions, according to the FBI criminal complaint. Findel, 44, continued to finance his lavish lifestyle by preparing false documents and reselling single mortgages multiple times to a variety of financial institutions, according to an FBI criminal. In July 2009 alone, Worldwide resold at least 27 such nonexistent mortgages, according to the FBI. Funds from the secondary lender’s account were wired through an escrow company to the account of WFR. Findel allegedly used those funds to pay corporate and personal expenses. The complaint alleges that Findel obtained more than $11 million from secondary lenders through his fraudulent mortgage transactions.

After the arrest of its owner, Worldwide Financial Resources shut down and more than 100 loan officers and up to 80 salaried employees in three offices may be out of work.

As for the Jets tickets, Findel said at the time he bought them at an auction he probably won’t ever use them because he bought them for his kids—11-year-old son Brandon and 7-year-old daughter Brooke. That’s not the only reason he may never sit in them. He faces up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine if convicted.