Be careful of helping your bank

I got an email today from a friend about a letter he just received from an attorney claiming that a major bank had lost some paperwork involving a mortgage that involved one of my friend’s old, long defunct corporations. The attorney “graciously” offered to prepare all the paperwork and bear all the costs of resurrecting that old corporation — just so my friend could sign some paperwork to clean up the bank’s mess.

Hmmm. That old corporation would then be alive again, the paperwork my friend signed would be current, and Citibank (oops, did I just say the name of the bank?) can of course be trusted. Look how well they are doing at taking care of their own business.

You can guess what my recommendation was….. “just say no”. You never know when the law of unintended consequences will raise its ugly head. When it comes to old businesses you used to be in, letting sleeping dogs lie is usually the best policy. The legal environment is continually evolving, and what used to be perfectly fine ten years ago may not be today.

Wanna bet that six months from now the bank will have found another way to solve its problem without involving my friend? Lost notes, indemnifying around title flaws, etc. are unfortunately part of the normal course of (bank) business these days.